Gay rights amendment

[Preechr]

Every single legal "right" afforded automatically to straight couples upon marriage can be gained by any two (or more, actually) people through legal means. If any of you know any gay couples that are holding their breath for their state government to pass some sort of gay marriage amendment, you should tell them to go ahead and see a lawyer and protect themselves sooner rather than waiting on the politicians to do it for them.

They can write up wills to ensure their estates transfer... which they should already have. They can sign papers that allow each other to make decisions in each other's stead given some sort of injury or illness. In fact, the only thing a gay couple can't legally do (so far) is legally challenge somebody else's right to not accept that they are "married," just like any other couple.

Personally, I don't accpet that the government has any right to be in the marriage business altogether. I would be happy if the whole issue were "privatized." Marriage is a contract that can be entered into and dissolved at will. While government may have in interest in propagation, it's a pretty big leap to micro-managing intimacy.

If two (3, 4... ? ) consenting adults wish to enter into one of these sort of contracts, they should be free to hunt down an organization willing to sponsor their union, with whatever ceremony and whatnot with which that organization prefers to mark such occasions. A legal contract should be signed, along with whatever other documents are required to guarantee the rights afforded to current legally married people. It should probably be handled as a bond issue, where the organization retains an interest in the union something in the order of a guarantor.

If the contract is broken or if the couple decides to dissolve or change it, they go back to the place they got it and end it or amend it according to the provisions of the original contract. The only time the government has to be involved is in the decision as to what makes one of these organizations acceptably legal and what happens when a contract is broken and no remedy is available within the civil structure of the contractual arrangement provided throught the organization... or maybe when a marriage contract outlives the organization that guaranteed it originally.

Simple. Of course, I also think ALL civil matters should be handled this way... I'm not a big fan of being told how to live at the threat of a gun, in case you forgot.