I don't think that's how it works. Everybody I know who's seriously in that place insists on government defining marriage as heterosexual only, and given how the issue has fared when it is exposed to voters they have no reason to compromise.

I think the reason that civil unions for everyone is coming up now is because it's one of the rare occasions in US history which shows that there are serious religious differences over marriage. The only other big instance I can think of is the early LDS church with polygamy.

The First Amendment says in part "Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof"; the Fourteenth applies that to state & local governments as well as Congress. A government definition of marriage which adheres to the Baptist definition and violates the Unitarian (Pennsylvania), or the other way around (Massachusetts), is not permitted under the Constitution any more than a government definition of prayer. But for most of US history that has been an almost totally theoretical issue, and had no traction.

I think our perceptions of the gender distinctives in relationships is colored by goals. AFAIK, you are not intending to enter a marriage that you intend to have no escape from. That was my goal in relationships, I was going to get married forever, and make the best of it even if it turned out it sucked despite my best efforts. I don’t think dating a man would have been so different than dating a woman, except for external reasons. Building a home with a man I think would have been very different.

Get your civil union and then go on and get whatever kind of ‘marriage ceremony’ you want.

Marriage doesn’t need to be protected. It’s always meant different things to different people, and will continue to mean things that you or I may not approve of to some people. And letting that happen is a matter of civil liberty and respect. Obviously, to me, it doesn’t have to involve just a man and a woman (it also wouldn’t necessarily require sexual exclusivity if I were doing it, so we disagree there too). You say that a “pair of gay men or a pair of gay women are much more the same than a straight woman and man are,” and not only do I think that’s not necessarily true (sure, maybe same-sexed bodies are more similar in their genitals and secondary sexual characteristics, but that’s not addressing the huge variations in body type, personality, emotional makeup, experiences, belief systems, or a thousand other things that can cut clear across gender lines), I’m not sure I’ve ever heard anyone try to define marriage as “a lasting commitment between two dissimilar-as-possible individuals”.

Plus, people of all sexualities can legally get married right now– we all know that gay and bisexual people marry into heterosexual relationships all the time. At the moment, no one is excluded by sexuality, but many are by wanting to live in honesty and commitment with the person they fall in love with. That makes me very sad.

I agree about government doing civil unions only, completely. But I am so very sick of the “gay men are already free to marry… a woman!” argument. Nothing naturally excludes gay people from being able to “live with, love, and share exclusive sex with someone hopefully compatible.” The gender part is the least of it.

See, I’m biased here, because I’m bisexual. I don’t like men and women exactly equally, I’m kinda boy-crazy, but I like plenty of women plenty well. And it’s not… it’s not different from the way I like guys. It’s not a separate feeling or a totally different kind of relationship. A date with a woman is a lot like a date with a man. (Also, if it was different, I’d have trouble seeing whose business that was.) The gender gulf just isn’t that wide.

And QP, I completely agree about the “but marriage is for grown-ups!” feeling–I still haven’t aged out of the sense that I shouldn’t be making any major life decisions, I’m just a kid. I expect this feeling to be gone by about age seventy.

My opinion is that the government should get its dirty hands off marriage altogether. Government should do nothing but civil unions, and provide those to gay and straight alike.

That being said, please remember that “These people, the ones who are being stupid,” is most people. When the Massachussets Supreme Court says “Without the right to choose to marry, one is excluded from the full range of human experience”, they are failing to understand all of what a marriage is. The gender distinction is part of what a marriage is, part of the marriage experience. A pair of gay men or a pair of gay women are much more the same than a straight woman and man are. Yes, gays are excluded from the marriage part of human experience, where you live with, love, and share exclusive sex with someone hopefully compatible but of a different gender. However, they are excluded from that by their sexuality, not by marriage laws.