[TITLE]
CMV: Marriage is between one man and one woman, because Marriage is intrinsically religious. The word Marriage should be removed from Government and changed to something around "Civil Union".
WMN: t3_3df9or_t1_ct4kmbq
Dialogue: t3_3df9or
[slai47]
Marriage as a word comes from the Middle english word *mariage*, which according to sources from Wikipedia, comes from around 1200-1300 CE. Word comes from another Old French word then to a Latin word *marītāre*, which describes a husband and wife. Adding on top of that, many modern religions using the word to describe the ceremony as a marriage between one man and one woman, I see that the word Marriage is intrinsically religious. Now moving to modern day, Marriage is changing as many people are adding to/changing the meaning to a word that many people use as a religious word. People are getting up in arms about these and I can see their points. Marriage in a lot of religions these days is still defined as one man and one woman. Now have a court/government adding to/changing that definition of that word, this is where I believe the whole issue is. The issue with people not wanting gay marriage based off religious beliefs is because a word is being used for something that it does not mean to them. Marriage is/from religion and should keep it that way. We need to rename Marriage in the government to remove this part of the issue that the anti-gay marriage community has with it. Now I know it still won't remove the whole problem that the anti-gay community has with gay marriage but I believe it will remove everyone who dislikes that this word, that is so entrenched in religion, is being redefined by a government decision. I even see a huge problem with these, I am not religious and completely for two consenting people getting married, no matter who/what they are. The government needs to change its vocabulary so that when you want your union to be legal, you go get a Civil Union(Or whatever we call it) from the government. But if you want to get married, you must find a religion that accepts your union. This returns marriage to Religion and I believe removes a huge part of the problems we are having in the acceptance of this practice. [Source of Etymology](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marriage#Etymology) HUGE EDIT: So /u/awa64 and /u/cptal has brought to my attention some information. The intrinsic nature of the word marriage that I was bringing up has some flaws. The act of marriage seems to have been more of a social thing rather than a religious thing off the bat. The church seemed to basically be the best at keeping records and the sacrament didn't come until later. So even though the nature of the word has been pretty much a religious definition for a while, the word itself is not intrinsically religious. [Here](http://www.sexarchive.info/ATLAS_EN/html/history_of_marriage_in_western.html) and [Here](https://www.reddit.com/r/AskHistorians/comments/1awx09/does_marriage_really_have_its_roots_in_religion/c91ik9s) are their sources they brought to me. So with further communications with others, I have been bringing up that society is changing the word marriage and my view is more of a fix to speed up that change at least on the religious vs government front. The word will change in society but that takes a long time. As /u/GAB104 and a few others pointed out, that religion has change a bit from what it used to be. The whole owning your wife and stuff seems to come up a lot. So my view has changed a little but I still view that changing the government wording to something else would be a good thing to do as to remove the current problems that many religious people(That care about the issue) have with the definition of that word being changed. Here in this comment, I quickly chat about my experience with Mormons that have issues with gay marriage: https://www.reddit.com/r/changemyview/comments/3df9or/cmv_marriage_is_between_one_man_and_one_woman/ct4n55g _____ > *Hello, users of CMV! This is a footnote from your moderators. We'd just like to remind you of a couple of things. Firstly, please remember to* ***[read through our rules](http://www.reddit.com/r/changemyview/wiki/rules)***. *If you see a comment that has broken one, it is more effective to report it than downvote it. Speaking of which,* ***[downvotes don't change views](http://www.reddit.com/r/changemyview/wiki/guidelines#wiki_upvoting.2Fdownvoting)****! If you are thinking about submitting a CMV yourself, please have a look through our* ***[popular topics wiki](http://www.reddit.com/r/changemyview/wiki/populartopics)*** *first. Any questions or concerns? Feel free to* ***[message us](http://www.reddit.com/message/compose?to=/r/changemyview)***. *Happy CMVing!*
[Nomisel]
All this would do would cause problems for the people who handle the paperwork. It wouldn't change the public semantics, and I'm sure the church would be just as mad, and the LGBT organizations will just get madder.
[BenIncognito]
[STA-CITE]> Marriage as a word comes from the Middle english word mariage, which according to sources from Wikipedia, comes from around 1200-1300 CE. Word comes from another Old French word then to a Latin word marītāre, which describes a husband and wife. Adding on top of that, many modern religions using the word to describe the ceremony as a marriage between one man and one woman, I see that the word Marriage is intrinsically religious. [END-CITE]The word marriage is just a word. It isn't intrinsically *anything*. It means whatever we've collectively decided it means, and for quite some time now it's been used to describe a romantic union, especially from a legal standpoint. I don't care what modern religious people use for their words. That doesn't mean anything to me, since I am not religious. [STA-CITE]> Now moving to modern day, Marriage is changing as many people are adding to/changing the meaning to a word that many people use as a religious word. People are getting up in arms about these and I can see their points. Marriage in a lot of religions these days is still defined as one man and one woman. Now have a court/government adding to/changing that definition of that word, this is where I believe the whole issue is. The issue with people not wanting gay marriage based off religious beliefs is because a word is being used for something that it does not mean to them. Marriage is/from religion and should keep it that way. We need to rename Marriage in the government to remove this part of the issue that the anti-gay marriage community has with it. [END-CITE]The government isn't changing the definition of anything. It's simply allowing gay people to operate under the umbrella of marriage like straight people already do. If you're religious and you have your own definition for marriage, well bully for you! But that doesn't mean you get to own the word. It just means you have your own definition for it. [STA-CITE]> Now I know it still won't remove the whole problem that the anti-gay community has with gay marriage but I believe it will remove everyone who dislikes that this word, that is so entrenched in religion, is being redefined by a government decision. I even see a huge problem with these, I am not religious and completely for two consenting people getting married, no matter who/what they are. The government needs to change its vocabulary so that when you want your union to be legal, you go get a Civil Union(Or whatever we call it) from the government. But if you want to get married, you must find a religion that accepts your union. This returns marriage to Religion and I believe removes a huge part of the problems we are having in the acceptance of this practice. [END-CITE]This is wholly unnecessary. Religious people simply need to get over it, they don't own the word. If I want to buy two rats and give them a marriage ceremony and go around calling them married I am free to do so. They can't stop me. But frankly, every time civil unions come up those same religious folks are against it. This "debate" isn't about the word marriage at all - that's just a way to make it look like your real problem isn't with gay people.
[chubbyurma]
"will you civilly unify me?" I think this is the only problem with your statement.
[moose2332]
In Biblical Marriages there were often one man-many women, adult-child, one man- many concubines, etc. Also women were bought and sold as an economic advantage. The idea of marrying for love is rather new. I don't think you support those marriages I listed. Why do we throw away tradition their but not in other places? Also marriage predates Christianity so why do we apply it's definition for marriage? Why do we have to follow any faith's code in a secular country?
[cat_mech]
To start, this: >I see that the word Marriage is intrinsically religious. Is fundamentally incorrect and not based in fact. If you willingly opt to perceive it that way as an expression of your personal opinions about the subject, that's well within your rights- but make no mistake, the claim that marriage is intrinsically linked to religion, or that 'traditional marriage' took the form of one man and one woman, or any claim by right wing bigots and fundamentalists that their religious practices or articles of faith provide any legitimate authority over determining what is or isn't socially acceptable as an act or state of marriage- *is an easily demonstrated, outright lie* (or just an ignorant untruth someone has been mislead into thinking is true). Ritual pair-bonding is an established universal human practice and custom that predates recorded history and appears in every culture- Eastern cultures and societies older than Christianity were practicing ritualized marriage customs without any influence of the Abrahamic faiths and cultures and we have undeniable amounts of anthropological evidence showing this- the distinct or individual religion or faith any society ultimately adopts is inconsequential to the fact that individuals in that society will actively engage in the social evolution of ritualized pair-bonding and marriage customs. This is a clear case of religion being a co-relative factor in the development of marriage customs, *not a causal factor*. Further, the widely accepted academic consensus holds that marriage originated in formalized inter-faction political negotiations and as a function of entrenching mutually established property and land ownership rights, and arranging the public pairbonding of sons and daughters between geopolitical factions as a method of substantiating legality and validity of the political and economic negotiations that were enmeshed into the ceremony (dowry, holdings, noble titles, etc) is a custom that both predates major religions (and likely even predates recorded history, albeit in substantially more simple expressions the further into the past one looks at) and demonstrates that religion has no valid authority over determining and imposing the definition of marriage, and that there is no foundation in the claim of any religious group to have any more right to determine what is or isn't marriage than any other group present in society. Next, the claim that 'traditional marriage is between one man and one woman' is once again an outright lie or simple ignorance on the part of those espousing the premise. The fact of the matter is that over the span of human history, polygamy is equally as prevalent as monogamy and very often more common than monogamy in marital customs across cultures and religions around the world. >Monogamy may seem central to marriage now, but in fact, polygamy was common throughout history. From Jacob, to Kings David and Solomon, Biblical men often had anywhere from two to thousands of wives. (Of course, though polygamy may have been an ideal that high-status men aspired to, for purely mathematical reasons most men likely had at most one wife). In a few cultures, one woman married multiple men, and there have even been some rare instances of group marriages. Etc, etc. The notion that marriage is a concept or custom that is intrinsically enmeshed with religion is simply untrue. The claims made by fundamentalist bigots in Christian America regarding ownership or providence over the social customs and traditions we call marriage **are outright lies with no factual basis**. The claims of the Right-Wing religious extremists in America that state they have any right whatsoever to impose their customs and force their views onto other human beings regarding marriage and traditions and sanctity of the social customs because marriage has foundations or roots in religion- or that the claim of 'one man one woman' is what represents a traditional marriage- is demonstrably and irrefutably deceit that requires nothing more than the miniscule effort of reviewing the issue free of the lens of the isolationist cultural myopia that allows right wing extremists to continually dominate the cultural landscape through perpetuating intentional hostility and antagonism via manufactured political conflicts. Once an individual steps back and applies base critical analysis, it's clear that there is no issue to argue and there is nothing admirable about legitimizing bigoted hate groups like the extreme right-wing American Christian cults by treating them as if they present an actual argument or position that has facets of validity and logic to it. The absurdity of retreating to arguing semantic and linguistic nuances of a specific word- marriage- become blatant and very clear the moment you take the line of reasoning that does so and introduce it to the fact that there are other countries and cultures around the world that use the exact same word, but clearly express customs that diverge sharply from the U.S.A. when using that term. Arguing the semantics of an issue that involves the universal human experience as though single linguistic definition can provide valid and demonstrable conclusions- and that authority could be derived through establishing control over a word and how it is used- becomes a farce the moment one is forced to acknowledge that other languages actually exist, and some people get married but *don't even speak English*! Idon'tevenknowhowtheydoit..... Anywaaaaaaaaaaaaaays: http://www.answers.com/Q/When_was_the_institution_of_marriage_invented&altQ=When_was_institution_of_marriage_invented#ixzz1xDTypZTW https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marriage#History_of_marriage_by_culture http://www.livescience.com/37777-history-of-marriage.html https://books.google.ca/books?id=dUPqg3l8E7kC&pg=PA174&lpg=PA174&dq=pre+christian+marriage+rites&source=bl&ots=atTJcsTTcB&sig=3kdr3Q2I-li9A-2GfefnN2-ByCQ&hl=en&sa=X&ved=0CFUQ6AEwB2oVChMI0JPyuIfexgIVyCYeCh0uawBC#v=onepage&q=pre%20christian%20marriage%20rites&f=false https://allseasonsweddings.com/wedding-ceremonies-readings
[Clockworkfrog]
Many religious people support gay marriage, why does the portion that does not have sole claim to the word?
[tgjer]
Putting aside the dubious claim that the concept of "marriage" is intrinsically religious, my church very actively encourages committed same gender couples to seek religious marriage blessings, in addition to the secular legal marriage contract. In fact just two weeks ago the Episcopal General Convention [**voted to extend the full sacrament of marriage to same gender couples with an 85% majority**](http://www.washingtonpost.com/news/acts-of-faith/wp/2015/07/01/why-the-episcopal-church-is-still-debating-gay-marriage/). Episcopal priests have been permitted to bless the marriages of same gender couples for decades, but it was at the discretion of their bishop and wasn't officially in the books. Now it is. And the Episcopal church is [**far**](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Blessing_of_same-sex_unions_in_Christian_churches) from [**alone**](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Same-sex_marriage_and_Judaism) in this regard. And renaming the legal marriage contract a "Civil Union Contract" or something similar was suggested back in the 90's. Most heterosexuals *hated* the idea. They hated it even more than they hated the idea of gay couples being able to legally marry. Everyone knows that terms like "Civil Union" or "Domestic Partnership" were invented to be the half-assed, not-REAL-marriage meant to pacify angry gay people while keeping the real thing heterosexual-only. The terms have too much negative baggage to ever be widely accepted. Even if the contents of the legal contract remained 100% the same, just the name was changed, to most heterosexuals being told that their own legal marriage is becoming a legal Civil Union feels like a demotion. Like their own relationship is being degraded to the position gay couple were expected to be satisfied with in the 90's. And despite the confusion over having a secular legal contract and various types of religious blessings sharing a single name, a large majority of people in the US now support legal marriage equality. And support for marriage equality specifically among religiously affiliated people is at about [**50% and rapidly rising**](http://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2015/04/religious-americans-support-gay-marriage/391646/). That fight is over, there's no point in changing the name of the contract now.
[GAB104]
You say that marriage is a historically religious concept. But what we now call science also used to fall under the auspices of religion, in pretty much every society. Also, religions have historically provided what we now call a legal or governmental framework. The Hebrew scriptures, for example, outline penalties for various behaviors they define as crimes. So if we are free now to separate science from faith, and church from state, then we are free to choose whether the word "marriage" belongs solely to religion, or if it is one of those matters, like criminal penalties, divorce, and the rights of adult daughters to disobey their fathers, that we now place in the legal/governmental realm. Your appeal to history also breaks down inasmuch as the definition of marriage has alreadychanged drastically over the years, in the hands of both religious and governmental authorities. Marriage in many major religions used to allow for one man and many wives, but few religions and governments allow this now. Marriage used to be synonymous with male ownership of a wife, and everything that she owned. In most religions, the wife didn't even have to be willing; she was the property of her father to begin with and had to marry whomever he chose to sell her to. The laws in western nations have put an end to this idea of ownership in a marriage, at times over the objections of religious authorities. Marriage used to be until death, without exception, a permanent state of being. Now it's quite temporary in some cases, at the insistence of legal authority. So this couples-only, egalitarian, potentially temporary, entirely voluntary arrangement is still called marriage, when it used to be polygynous, involuntary for the woman at least, male-dominated, and permanent. If we can change a thing that much without changing the name, we can allow same-sex couples and still call it marriage.
[slai47]
I see your points and your are right. The idea and definition of marriage has changed a lot but how long did that take to happen. Since the government is changing this, it means more to people rather than if society, just changes it. Its going to change, just give it time. This event is similar to events like you said when polymony was made illegal, was as many people affected, no. But similarities can be see as the definition of a word was changed by a government and people were affected.
[MasterGrok]
I would be fine with this argument if religious people hadn't so adamantly wanted marriage (along with other religious terms) to be officially sanctioned by the government. If you want the government to recognize your religious ceremony officially, you can't then complain when the government states that they will recognize that ceremony without discriminating based on race, gender, or religion. The time to demand that the government call it a civil union is long past. Marriage is now a part of our culture, law, and financial institutions. It is no longer defined simply be religion regardless of its origin.
[slai47]
Good point. I definitely agree with you. Since they argued for that right, they need to deal with all the repercussions that come with it. I still see the word Marriage as being more religious than legal or financial but that is just my view ;).
[jetpacksforall]
So long as the state performs the same ceremony and the relationship conveys the same benefits and operates under the same name, it should be constitutional. In that sense it doesn't matter whether you call it marriage or civil union or wedlock or ball-and-chain or humpbuddies. So in that sense I agree with you. Where I disagree is that the problem wouldn't end there. How would the Christian Right react to a move to abolish the word 'marriage' from civil ceremonies and government documents? They would freak the hell out, obviously. "Liberals want to abolish marriage!! They're destroying our way of life! Christianity is under attack! Halp!!" In other words the same people would shriek just as loudly about practically the same exact things that they are shrieking about today. There is no making those people happy with pretty much anything that happens in the modern world, and trying to make them happy is a fool's errand.
[slai47]
They would shriek at that too but I feel if we go off the main premise that we are handing them the word marriage back and just using a different word for the exact same thing. I feel they wouldn't freak out so much until some website posts up that exact clickbait title you put up.
[Piratiko]
Marriage is basically a homonym. It has a religious meaning and a legal meaning. The whole debate around marriage equality, in my eyes, boils down to the refusal of both sides to give up the word 'marriage'. I'd argue that marriage should retain its legal definition and be divorced (ha!) from religion. Religious marriage should be called 'matrimony'
[slai47]
Isn't the term for having been through a matrimony a marriage? That might not come out quite right but hope you can understand it. I got a good chuckle out of your divorced idea. I agree both sides want it and I think the easiest way to fix it, is change the legal side. That is quite easy, just change a word on a document and BAM! Done.
[dale_glass]
It's not a single document, though. It's many documents. For instance there's such a thing as a visa to bring your fiancee to the US, which specifically references marriage. So the deal with something like "civil union" is that a separate fight would be needed per piece of legislation. Redefining marriage neatly ensures that no such thing is needed, which is why it's a fight worth fighting.
[MasterGrok]
The thing is this already happened. The government has long recognized marriages based on religious ceremonies that have no history of traditional marriage as well as based on civil ceremonies that have no connection to marriage whatsoever. Trying to bring the word back to solely have a religious definition at this point is intellectually dishonest. It has had numerous definitions for decades.
[aenaumf]
[STA-CITE]> Marriage as a word comes from the Middle english word mariage, which according to sources from Wikipedia, comes from around 1200-1300 CE. Word comes from another Old French word then to a Latin word marītāre, which describes a husband and wife. [END-CITE]I'm not sure how that helps support the claim that marriage is intrinsically religious. Religious views about marriage have changed a lot since the 13th century. Back then, the Catholic church hadn't recognized marriage as a sacrament, and marriages didn't usually take place in churches, for example. Marriage has always been a largely secular thing - your church might play a big role in your wedding ceremony, but it probably doesn't play much of a role in your every day married life, or in the important legal stuff that stems from marriage, like joint tax returns, green cards, inheritance, and divorce proceedings. [STA-CITE]> many modern religions using the word to describe the ceremony as a marriage between one man and one woman [END-CITE]Some modern religions also use the word to describe same-sex marriages, and many modern religions recognize both secular and religious concepts of marriage. [STA-CITE]> The government needs to change its vocabulary so that when you want your union to be legal, you go get a Civil Union(Or whatever we call it) from the government. [END-CITE]Wouldn't people go on calling it marriage in every day life, though? Do people really care what it is called on official documents? I also don't think you have considered how complicated this would be. There is a wealth of federal, state, and even international law that mentions "marriage". Changing all that just isn't feasible, and a lot of people would be dead set against it. [STA-CITE]> Now I know it still won't remove the whole problem that the anti-gay community has with gay marriage [END-CITE]Can you name *any* prominent opponents of same-sex marriage who would support this? Or anyone at all who isn't an internet libertarian?
[slai47]
I lived in Provo, Utah for a while. Mormon Capital of the world. Two of my coworkers were against gay marriage but marriage is between a man and a woman. Not two men or two women. I had purposed to them that if we changed the legal definition a while back to something else and left each religion to decide what marriage means to them, how would they feel. They loved the idea because they had a real problem with it. Now these two were your everyday a little religious mormons. Not crazy religious but still very faithful. So I'm betting that is probably a good portion of the mormon community(It's a very faithful and very religious religion from how much I meet). Now people would call it marriage, but that is society changing the definition compared to the government changing it which is the problem in my view. Or at least I can see the problem people are having. Religions are free to call their form of marriage whatever they want. That is fine. This is the government word marriage that is changing. I think that people attribute the government and religious versions of the word marriage to be the similar and thus causing the issue I am talking about. Sources on you first bit about marriage as a sacrament? Well the daily life stuff you talk about marriage especially tax returns, green cards and stuff like it are kind of recent(last 200 years) type of thing. They probably weren't there when marriages first started happening. I have heard from another person that inheritance played a huge role in the creation of the idea of marriage and the church was used to keep records because they were good at that. Still waiting on sources for that info.
[RustyRook]
[STA-CITE]> The issue with people not wanting gay marriage based off religious beliefs is because a word is being used for something that it does not mean to them. [END-CITE][STA-CITE]>> Marriage is/from religion and should keep it that way. [END-CITE][Many religious institutions do support same-sex marriages](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Religious_views_on_same-sex_marriage#Religious_support). I don't believe that religious views about this matter are as consistent as you think. Why should one Church's views supersede another's? And the word is entrenched in legal language as well as society. It means "more" somehow than civil union. I don't know why, but that seems to be the case. Separate but equal isn't actually equal, is it /u/slai47?
[slai47]
Never is equal. I see that more and more institutions are accepting it and that is great. I just think the word has more Religious meaning then legal meaning and legal terms can always change.
[RustyRook]
[STA-CITE]> I just think the word has more Religious meaning then legal meaning and legal terms can always change. [END-CITE]About the legal meaning: Why does it need to change? For the sake of institutions that are losing significance every week? These institutions have promoted hateful, sexist, bigoted views for millennia. Tell me, have you heard of a heterosexual atheist couple say, "Let's get a civil union"? I've never heard it. The word marriage is used as a shorthand for the commitment by two people to spend their time together and to support each other. It has **weight** in a way that "civil union" does not. Besides, what's next? Should non-religious people be disallowed from using words like sacrament as well? By the way, another redditor said that we should use "matrimony" as the religious word for marriage. That's unrealistic because: 1) Religious folk are never going to back down; 2) It means "the state of being in a marriage." Edit: clarity
[slai47]
What does it change? I think it will remove the emotional attachment that religious people have to that word. Wait you have seen a heterosexual atheist get married? Where? jk ;P No society can change the word marriage but as I point out in multiple other comments, its the fact that government is changing the word in their definition and for some people they can't let that go. They can't allow the word to have multiple meanings. I'm just trying to fix an issue that personally, society will fix in years to come as the word becomes less and less attributed to just heterosexual couples. Those institutions have promoted that stuff and some still do. A lot of people are waking up to it as we are seeing an increase in many people saying they are not religious. But not to be confused with them becoming atheists. I think a lot of people are noticing that religions are great ways to get money out of people. Some religions do do a lot of help with that money but still there are many that don't.
[RustyRook]
[STA-CITE]> its the fact that government is changing the word in their definition and for some people they can't let that go. [END-CITE]Meh, it's not like the Church didn't shoehorn itself into the picture. You asked for proof that the sacrament of marriage was developed much later - [here's your proof]((https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marriage_(Catholic_Church)#Sacramental_development)). It's an interesting read. [STA-CITE]> A lot of people are waking up to it as we are seeing an increase in many people saying they are not religious. But not to be confused with them becoming atheists. [END-CITE]Not true. You can read [this Pew survey report](http://www.pewforum.org/2015/05/12/americas-changing-religious-landscape/) to get an idea of the change. The number of self-reported atheists doubled b/w 2007 and 2014. The data is on the first page, just take a look at the chart.
[slai47]
I was an atheist for a while because I thought I was. But when I actually looked up what I was, I turned to be more of an Agnostic or theist. I'm betting a lot of people could be in the same boat. Thank you for the proof. I just like to see sources rather than just taking someone on the internet's word for it. I actually updated the post above with an edit.
[RustyRook]
A non-theist is probably the most "accurate" label you can choose. Atheism is a useful label in a social context as well, so I wouldn't disregard it. [STA-CITE]> Thank you for the proof. I just like to see sources rather than just taking someone on the internet's word for it. I actually updated the post above with an edit. [END-CITE]You're welcome. Remember to award deltas to those you've mentioned in the edit if they did c your v.
[slai47]
I have never done one. Can I award multiple ones as there was about 4 people that contributed to it. Edit: Figured it out.
[slai47]
∆ for showing multiple sources and bringing up points that I didn't think of
[DeltaBot]
Confirmed: 1 delta awarded to /u/RustyRook. ^[[History](/r/changemyview/wiki/user/RustyRook)] ^[[Wiki](http://www.reddit.com/r/changemyview/wiki/deltabot)][[Code](https://github.com/alexames/DeltaBot)][/r/DeltaBot]
[Bluezephr]
Words change over time, and that's fine. There's absolutely no reason to feel this passionate about a single word evolving within a language. If the crux of your argument is that you don't want a single word's meaning to changing even slightly, despite that it happens all the time, you don't have much of an argument. Even if the word has changed slightly, religious people could easy contextualize what they are talking about by saying "religious marriage", or "traditional christian marriage" or "heterosexual marriage" or "one partner has a penis one partner has a vagina don't worry we checked marriage".
[slai47]
I agree, words change over time. It sometimes needs to happen as a word can have multiple means and it depends on the context it is used in that can define its meaning. Words grow over time, it is what helps a language grow. We could just contextualize instead of changing it. That is another way of fixing it. But I believe because of marriage's intrinsic nature to religion, the idea of a government/court changing the definition is the huge issue that the anti-gay/religious community has with the recent events. If society as a whole changes the word, then so be it(Takes a lot longer and when do we say that a society has changed the word is a whole different topic) but since the government is changing the definition, its causing issues.
[Bluezephr]
The word has already changed when referring to people, the government is just applying it legally. When you hear people talking about gay marriage, you will hear things like "I wish it was legal to get married", When opponents talk about it, they refer to it as "gay marriage". Even if they argue the definition angle like you are, they still use the word "gay marriage" because we as people totally understand and accept what that means. There is no confusion, no one is going "wait, gay marriage? That's confusing, I don't understand what you are saying". Like it or not, the word is already changed in people's vocabulary.
[slai47]
The word has been changing but now the government is changing that word. People feel this word is theirs and the government is changing it compared to society. That is a huge issue for certain people that want to own the word marriage and always keep a certain definition of it. Another person brought up that people wanted to have marriage be apart of government to have inheritance and other bonuses. This is now a repercussion of having those bonuses that maybe they didn't think of. Once you attach your idea to something that can change, you need to know that your idea can change.
[princessbynature]
[STA-CITE]>People feel this word is theirs and the government is changing it compared to society. [END-CITE]The only reason the government gives a shit about marriage is because we have secular government. Notice marriage licenses come from the government? If marriage is intrinsic to religion why was I able to get married and have not a single person, place or thing that could be even remotely considered religious involved? I suspect that when people make this argument, about marriage being a religious thing, they are not considering that before the US existed there was not such thing as a secular government. That's what makes the US special. Secularism was a product of the Elightenment, which followed the religious wars. The revolution was the decade leading up to the declaration of independence where the people of the Colonies came to realize that a government separated from the church is the only way to secure liberty for all people. Marriage was not just a religious ceremony for the sake of religion. It was a legal contract that afforded certain rights and responsibilities to both people. So once the US government is established, the religious part of a marriage is of no concern as far as the government is concerned. But the government is concerned with legal disputes that arise and must recognize a marriage in order to make a judgement. For example, a man dies and has a surviving spouse and children. It is the government who will settle any legal disputes, not the church. So marriage has become an institution that is both religious and civil, but it is only the civil part that the law is concerned with. So yeah, over the centuries marriage was a religious and civil institution - it is one word with two meanings, both have been around as long as the other but it isn't obvious because secularism is still fairly new.
[Aclopolipse]
[STA-CITE]> That is a huge issue for certain people that want to own the word marriage and always keep a certain definition of it. [END-CITE]Tough squash. Outside of copyright law, nobody can "own" a word. The meaning of a word is determined by those who speak the language. And with the U.S. population recently coming around to a majority in favor of gay marriage, all countries in the "Anglosphere" (i.e. the countries whose populations decide how English is used) now have a majority in favor of the word marriage including unions between two men and two women. And if this definition change is the will of English speakers, it will become part of English.
[slai47]
Society will change the world. This is more of a fix to for right now. Check the edit in the post.
[Bluezephr]
In my other post, you'll see that society has already changed the word marriage. If I told you "Bob and Steve got married" would you be confused? would that not make sense because those are male names? no, you'd understand exactly what I meant. Alternatively, If I told you my friend was Indian, and he turned out to not be from India, you would probably be more confused than the marriage point, yet in Canadian legislation "Indian status" refers to aboriginals, not native Indians. Do you see how society has already changed that definition?
[slai47]
Society is changing more and more and that will happen. I just think the anti-gay group is having more issue with the change because the government is changing it. Society will change it in time but I feel we could speed up the process by doing this. I really wouldn't care if my marriage would legally be changed to a civil union. If my wife and I get religiously married, we do. We will still probably call our civil union a marriage because of societal norms.
[cdb03b]
It has already happened. The legal definitions are lagging behind society and just now catching up.
[Bluezephr]
No, that's already happened. You seem to think there's like this end point that we'll reach where everyone just agrees, but the word changing is really only relevant if it can effectively help us communicate, and it absolutely does. The anti-gay group is using the definition of the word to grasp at straws because they are not comfortable with gay people being together. Anyone who cares that much about a word definition is completely irrational and should not be catered to. Maybe you wouldn't care if your marriage was called a civil union, but I don't think its worth waiting while we amend every god damn legal document to search and replace "marriage" with "civil union" to cater to either bigots or irrational language preservationists. We could just (and have) amended the legal definition of marriage to include homosexual couples.
[Bluezephr]
No, the government is changing the legality of term marriage so that homosexual couples can in the eyes of the law have the same rights and privileges of heterosexual couples. Its the most practical solution. What we want is equal rights for homosexual couples, all the current laws that exist pertaining to marriage, we just want that for gay people. The easiest solution is to just add it the legal definition, because all that does is affect how it is handled in legal issues. The word marriage can still change, or mean whatever you want it to mean personally. In certain communities it might still always pertain to heterosexual marriage. In a court though, people will be able to use the word marriage because in that court it will refer to the rights given to all couples, regardless of sexuality. This is not as big of a deal as you're making it out to be. Here in Canada, we have this thing called [the Indian Act](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Indian_Act). You probably know already that this is not a piece of legislation referring to people from India, but actually affects Aboriginals in Canada. Legally, you can obtain "Indian Status", and legally, reservations are called "Indian Reservations", and despite this being the legal terminology, it's still rude as fuck and not common to hear people referring to them as Indians in conversation. If someone is talking about another person and says they are "Indian" I assume they are talking about someone from India, unless it's clearly a distasteful joke. Unless you actually want to exclude homosexuals from having equal rights, focusing on the definition of the word is just dodging the issue.
[awa64]
Marriage started off as a civil institution in Europe, a way of linking families together, confirming inheritance and managing property rights. Love wasn't a factor, and arranged marriages were the rule, rather than the exception. And when I say it was a civil institution, I MEAN it was a civil institution. It was administered by the state, and the church's first involvement in the practice came because they were a reliable and literate record-keeping body, not because of any spiritual significance to the institution.
[slai47]
Could you send a source for that information? That would be a huge crack in my logic and never heard of that.
[cptal]
There's this askhistorians [thread](https://www.reddit.com/r/AskHistorians/comments/1awx09/does_marriage_really_have_its_roots_in_religion/c91ik9s)
[slai47]
∆ for showing evidence that lead to sources that invalids a main point in my view
[DeltaBot]
This delta is currently disallowed as your comment contains either no or little text ([comment rule 4](http://www.reddit.com/r/changemyview/wiki/rules#wiki_rule_4)). Please include an explanation for how /u/cptal changed your view. If you edit this in, replying to my comment will make me rescan yours. ^[[Wiki](http://www.reddit.com/r/changemyview/wiki/deltabot)][[Code](https://github.com/alexames/DeltaBot)][/r/DeltaBot]
[awa64]
[Sure.](http://www.sexarchive.info/ATLAS_EN/html/history_of_marriage_in_western.html) It's weird to think about today, in a culture that has a strong separation between church and state, but it was a revolutionary concept in the 1500s—Kings and Queens ruled by divine right, therefore the state and the church were under the same umbrella of authority, with the Pope occasionally (and controversially) pulling rank on the aforementioned Kings and Queens, and local churches acting as courts of law to resolve disputes.
[slai47]
∆ for bring a source that invalids a main argument that I brought up
[DeltaBot]
This delta is currently disallowed as your comment contains either no or little text ([comment rule 4](http://www.reddit.com/r/changemyview/wiki/rules#wiki_rule_4)). Please include an explanation for how /u/awa64 changed your view. If you edit this in, replying to my comment will make me rescan yours. ^[[Wiki](http://www.reddit.com/r/changemyview/wiki/deltabot)][[Code](https://github.com/alexames/DeltaBot)][/r/DeltaBot]
[princessbynature]
Try to remember that before the US, no secular country existed so civil and religious law were one in the same. Marriage is both because civil law and religious law were the same thing. The nature of the colonies, being 13 colonies each with a different government and each a different religion, were brought together under the idea of liberty, to form the republic.
[quigonjen]
Heck, it predates the church. Civil marriages, complete with rites and rituals occurred at least as far back as Ancient Greece, and seem to stretch back much further than that. The idea of a political and social pairing with an economic benefit to one or both individuals long predates Judeochristian practice and ritual.