Part of me thinks the government has thrown up this issue to distract everyone from the really bad stuff that they are doing. What I said about it before stands, but I am being put into a little dilemma, since people have started sending me pro gay marriage petitions to sign and circulate and I feel what I believe is too nuanced to do either. I think if gay civil marriage comes in - and I would be very happy for that to happen - it will not take long before some vicar is hauled over to the European Court to answer Human Rights charges. And I doubt if the vicar would win in the current climate. I think this would be unfair - you cannot expect to overturn cultural practices that have lasted centuries in less than a decade. There was massive opposition to civil partnerships ten years ago, why do they think those people will have changed their minds? It takes longer than 10 years - for some people, they will never change their minds.
What upsets me is the thought of people deliberately asking clergy to marry them so that they can bring a test case. I much dislike homophobic people - but the definition of homophobic has broadened so massively in the last few years that probably this blog entry would be categorised as homophobic by some people. This seems to be a reflection of an immature political situation/level of awareness. It's rather like a black person dodging any disagreement with "you're racist" - which used to happen a bit (the answer to the "you're saying that because your're racist" is of course "no, I'm saying it because I don't agree with you"... or "it's not that, it's because yu're an idiot" - I'm sure that would calm the situation down - not.
Ned said "if you were gay, why would you want a homophobic person to marry you?" This is the crux of the matter - if all sides would accept each other's positions, however benighted, then we might get somewhere, but as usual the whole thing has become savagely polarised so that it looks like evil Christians vs. saintly gays.... I haven't heard much about Muslims and gay marriage yet... I remember when the Sexual Equality legislation came in in 1975? that private clubs were excluded from admitting women equally - and there are still gents' clubs (and perhaps working men's clubs) that exclude women from membership...presumably churches could be excluded from this legislation. It might seem unfair to outsiders, but really the churches need to work this one out on their own - without external pressure from people who have nothing to do with them.
What upsets me is the thought of people deliberately asking clergy to marry them so that they can bring a test case. I much dislike homophobic people - but the definition of homophobic has broadened so massively in the last few years that probably this blog entry would be categorised as homophobic by some people. This seems to be a reflection of an immature political situation/level of awareness. It's rather like a black person dodging any disagreement with "you're racist" - which used to happen a bit (the answer to the "you're saying that because your're racist" is of course "no, I'm saying it because I don't agree with you"... or "it's not that, it's because yu're an idiot" - I'm sure that would calm the situation down - not.
Ned said "if you were gay, why would you want a homophobic person to marry you?" This is the crux of the matter - if all sides would accept each other's positions, however benighted, then we might get somewhere, but as usual the whole thing has become savagely polarised so that it looks like evil Christians vs. saintly gays.... I haven't heard much about Muslims and gay marriage yet... I remember when the Sexual Equality legislation came in in 1975? that private clubs were excluded from admitting women equally - and there are still gents' clubs (and perhaps working men's clubs) that exclude women from membership...presumably churches could be excluded from this legislation. It might seem unfair to outsiders, but really the churches need to work this one out on their own - without external pressure from people who have nothing to do with them.
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