Marriage Equality

John Key has confirmed that he will support Louisa Wall's marriage equality bill through all its readings. This all but guarantees the passage of the bill as any unsure National MP's are likely to fall into line behind JK.

I have found the number of different reasons opponents of marriage equality come up with quite interesting and thought I would look at a few of them:

The definition of marriage is between a man and a woman.

The definition of marriage used to include a ban on inter-racial and inter-faith marriages, as well as a ban on divorce. Marriage also used to involve the transfer of a woman from her father's possession to her husband's. The definition of marriage has been evolving for years, in fifty years time the idea that gay people weren't allowed to marry will seem ludicrous.

Marriage is about procreation.

There are many reasons people decided to get married, procreation being one of them. It has been known for quite a while now that to have children you don't need to be married and that being married doesn't force you to have children. Every time somebody repeats this statement it is a kick in the guts to married couples who are unable to have children, as if their marriage is somehow worth less.

Children need both a mother and a father.

Children need parents who love them. Anyone who can explain to me how the Kahui twins were better off with their mother and father than they would have been with a loving same-sex couple wins fifty dollars.

The children of same-sex parents will be bullied at school.

There are thousands of children of same-sex parents already at New Zealand schools and some of them are bullied. I don't understand how society recognising their parent's relationship as equal to others will make this worse.

Same-sex marriage will lead to polygamy

This misses the point on a number of levels. I'm not aware of any movement within New Zealand to legalise polygamy, most New Zealanders are and I imagine will remain committed to monogamous relationships. Marriage equality is about an end to discrimination based on sexual orientation, not about the number of wives one may have, which I think we can all agree is a lifestyle or religious choice. I may not personally agree with one man having multiple wives, but if three people, regardless of gender, are in a loving relationship, why shouldn't they have legal recognition of that?

Mr Craig told 3 News that people choose to be gay rather than being born that way, many as a result of being abused as children.

Colin Craig is quite the piece of work. But at least he brings a bit of colour to the debate with his insane views. I imagine that before he made this statement he spoke to not a single gay person about the "choice" they made or the sexual abuse that precipitated it.

Civil unions already provide marriage equality.

This just isn't true. Legally civil union couples, whether homosexual or heterosexual, are denied the right to adopt children. Civil unions also create a second tier of relationship, based upon a person's sexual orientation, which is discrimination and Government's should not discriminate based upon sexual orientation.

The DomPost has a verus opinion piece today between a Catholic priest and a Presbyterian minister. Margaret Mayman's (the minister)piece is fantastic. Merv Duffy's (the priest)piece is all over the show. But does include this gem:

The Civil Union Act generated a huge bill for government departments as innumerable forms required adaptation to allow for the public recognition of those unions. The same departments will incur another significant expense as every marriage document and database has the words "bride" and "bridegroom" removed and replaced by some bland gender-neutral term.

When you are arguing against marriage equality because of the cost to Government departments I think you are losing the battle.