Heterosexual couple wanting civil partnership lose

[Bubbles]

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-35436845


Do you think they have been discriminated against?

Or are they making a fuss over nothing?

[Udayana]

I don't understand their objections to a normal civil marriage.
Seems spurious.

On the other hand I can't see why we have two different contracts, marriage and civil partnership, when a single contract would be adequate. I would be inclined to extend civil partnership and abolish marriage altogether.

[SusanDoris]

Thank you for posting that, Rose. I haven't looked at the link, and I don't know if the decision will count as discrimination or not, but it seems logical to me that if two people want to make a legal partnership, whatever they want to call it, then the terms of such partnerships should be the same for all. I should think that the term, legal partnership, should cover all, whether man/woman, man/man, or /woman/woman.

Other legal partnerships which would enable, e.g. sisters, to inherit etc could have a different form of wording. 

[King Oberon]

Seems nonsensical to me not to update the civil partnership law.

It's shown couples that you can have a legal contract drawn up and recognised by the state without having to go through 'conventional' marriage.

Not for everyone i'm sure but if people want it, it does no harm then, like gay marriage I can't see what the problem is. I suspect the only objectors to be the same ones that didn't want gay marriage.. as the article says "An important part of the foundation of modern human rights and equality law is the protection against discrimination on grounds including sexual orientation."

So it's discrimination plain and simple. Shame on the courts but then judges are about as up to date as the church when it comes to 'real' life. 

[SqueakyVoice]

I couldn't care less, I only ever supported the gays being allowed to marry because it got me a 5% discount on my subscription to Antitheist Weekly.

(Just don't tell chunsty that will you...)

[Owlswing]

On another thread Vlad has been working himself up to apoplectic fury at people who supported civil partnerships only as a tool to attack the church in order to lever it, the church, into having to perform same-sex-marriages. According to Vlad this was an act of duplicity and hypocricy.

I think that this couple are doing a bit of reverse-engineering and trying to accuse those who supported civil partnerships as an interim measure towards same-sex-marriage of discrimination.

[Hope]

Shame on the courts but then judges are about as up to date as the church when it comes to 'real' life. 

Unless they are creating precedent that allows for actions that government dislike or pressure groups want.  Think, for instance, about the latest ruling that will allow 3 kids and a teenager, originally in the 'Jungle' in Calais ,to come and join a family member already here in the UK.

[Shaker]

I couldn't care less, I only ever supported the gays being allowed to marry because it got me a 5% discount on my subscription to Antitheist Weekly.

(Just don't tell chunsty that will you...)

If you pay for a 12-month subscription by direct debit you get 20% off, by the way

[Walt Zingmatilder]

On another thread Vlad has been working himself up to apoplectic fury at people who supported civil partnerships only ads a tool to attack the church in order to lever it, the church, into having to perform same-sex-marriages. According to Vlad this was an act of duplicity and hypocricy.

I think that this couple are doing a bit of reverse-engineering and trying to accuse those who supportered civil partnerships as an interim measure towards same-sex-marriage of discrimination.

You got that completely wrong.  My "fury" was directed at those who used gay marriage as an equality issue against the church and who now side with HM Government in it's inequality regarding civil partnerships.

It wasn't the first time I had made the case and I seem to recall a forum member echoing the same sentiment as the government expressed today on the issue.

[Walt Zingmatilder]

If you pay for a 12-month subscription by direct debit you get 20% off, by the way

Does it still come with the free plastic toy?

[Shaker]

You got that completely wrong.  My "fury" was directed at those who used gay marriage as an equality issue against the church and who now side with HM Government in it's inequality regarding civil partnerships.

Those people whose existence you were never able to demonstrate. Ah yes, I remember.

[Walt Zingmatilder]

Those people whose existence you were never able to demonstrate. Ah yes, I remember.

Hardly surprising since the forum is regularly valetted and unless one keeps ones own archive you cannot quote the reply. Nevertheless we know from the government and the judiciary it is possible to see the lack of gay marriage as an inequality while being blind to the inequality in opportunity for civil partnership.

[Shaker]

Hardly surprising since the forum is regularly valetted and unless one keeps ones own archive you cannot quote the reply.

Yes ... yes ... Hope regularly pulls that one too.

[Owlswing]

Hardly surprising since the forum is regularly valetted and unless one keeps ones own archive you cannot quote the reply. Nevertheless we know from the government and the judiciary it is possible to see the lack of gay marriage as an inequality while being blind to the inequality in opportunity for civil partnership.

Civil Partnership was only ever intended as an interim measure whilst the legal definition, as opposed to the clerical definition, of marriage was put under investigation to determine exactly what the status of the term "marriage" was.

The Government, in its wisdom, for once, determined that "marriage" in this country was a legal term and not a clerical one. It was the church which fought a vicious homophobic campaign to prevent same-sex-marriage, even some clerics deemed the church's public stance to be un-christian. Hence why some churches and some clerics will now allow and perform, respectively, same-sex-marriages. 

It is a crying shame that this country does not have the much-vaunted separation of church and state that (supposedly) exists in the U S.

[Jack Knave]

I'm not sure what a civil partnership really means in legal terms and the details or what the overall ethos and concept it is suppose to cater for?

Or how it differs from marriage and the advantage this couple would have from it as oppose to being married - tax?

[Shaker]

I'm not sure what a civil partnership really means in legal terms and the details or what the overall ethos and concept it is suppose to cater for?

Or how it differs from marriage and the advantage this couple would have from it as oppose to being married - tax?

There are certain differences between a CP and civil marriage - relatively minor, specific ones perhaps but they are nevertheless there; so those people who used to say that CPs offer all the same benefits of marriage (usually in a tone which implied that gay couples should be grateful for this crumb thrown from the table) were wrong. I posted a link once to a website which outlined these differences.

As for its ethos and purpose, good question. Many of us felt at the time that in creating a two-tier, separate and unequal system it was a sweetener for the anti brigade who had an attack of the vapours at the mere thought of marriage (civil marriage at that) being extended to gay couples, at a time when the concept was deemed (by a supposedly liberal and progressive party) to be too terrifying for the horses.

I have no particular dog in this fight; I felt and feel that CPs were a fudge, a half-arsed, lily-livered compromise because the moral courage to do the job properly was then lacking - and it took a good number of years more and, even worse, the Tories, the party of Clause 28, to set matters right. What I do think however is that so long as the two-tier system remains, it should be open to all.

[Humph Warden Bennett]

The Judge has taken the view that the legislation which established Civil Partnerships was intended to benefit gay people only ( I think this is what is known as "The Mischief Rule", as to what was the intention of Parliament when passing the legislation?) The government appear to be taking the view that CP's were a half house set up by their political opponents, unlike the Tories who went all the way.

As for some mangina who thinks that marriage discriminates against women, if he wants to make a fuss he is at liberty to do so. The law can always be changed again, but I am reminded of all those workplace IT agreements relating to the "Wordnet" system which enabled electronic typewriters to link up with each other using telephone lines. They were never updated because Wordnet was rendered obsolete by the Internet.

[Walt Zingmatilder]

Civil Partnership was only ever intended as an interim measure whilst the legal definition, as opposed to the clerical definition, of marriage was put under investigation to determine exactly what the status of the term "marriage" was.

The Government, in its wisdom, for once, determined that "marriage" in this country was a legal term and not a clerical one. It was the church which fought a vicious homophobic campaign to prevent same-sex-marriage, even some clerics deemed the church's public stance to be un-christian. Hence why some churches and some clerics will now allow and perform, respectively, same-sex-marriages. 

It is a crying shame that this country does not have the much-vaunted separation of church and state that (supposedly) exists in the U S.

This is the typical post which uses the equality argument against the Church
and excuses the inequality within the civil partnership legislation.

Terms like vicious are just Owlballs.

[Walt Zingmatilder]

The Judge has taken the view that the legislation which established Civil Partnerships was intended to benefit gay people only.

.....and the legislation on marriage was intended to benefit straight people.......

........because until recently it was a non issue.

[Owlswing]

This is the typical post which uses the equality argument against the Church
and excuses the inequality within the civil partnership legislation.

Terms like vicious are just Owlballs.

Terms like vicious describe the kind of unpleasant terms used to describe gay people during the debate on whether SSM was to be even considered much less allowed.

To deny this is just another case of Vladedictions.

[Udayana]

Why should people who have signed a piece of paper together have special rights anyway - isn't this just discrimination against singles?

[Shaker]

The government appear to be taking the view that CP's were a half house set up by their political opponents, unlike the Tories who went all the way.

It grieves me to have to agree with you   It is a bizarre situation indeed where the party always supposed to be associated with humane and progressive values predicated on social equality botched the job, and the party of tradition, reaction and repression did the job properly.

But then it wasn't the Labour Party who decriminalised homosexuality who were also responsible for CPs but Blair's personal vanity project masquerading as such.

[ippy]

Apart from it making a bit more paperwork, I can't see why not, what harm would it do?
 
ippy

[Owlswing]

. . . Blair's personal vanity project . . .

I thought that that was the Iraq War!

But then again, who on Earth would trust the judgement of a man who looked across a crowded room and saw Cherie Booth and decided that she was the most beautiful woman in the world!