Dear Yuyutsu,
If I hear you correctly, you're saying the government should not have any laws governing social norms pertaining to marriage and other such personal affairs. You say they have no right to tell you what to do in your own bedroom.  
If so, what is the point or benefit in having same sex unions sanctioned or condoned by the state? 

 

Dear Dan,

"If so, what is the point or benefit in having same sex unions sanctioned or condoned by the state?"

None whatsoever.

I was not asking the state to sanction or condone anything, only to register.

It is my preference that the state do not mockingly attempt to sanction or condone ANY kind of union between individuals, including a man with a woman.
It is my preference that the word "marriage" should not even appear anywhere in legislation, but since it currently does, and since there are all sorts of legal privileges attached to the fact of being registered as "married" (regardless even of the actual existence or absence of a true marriage, as discussed earlier), then so long as this is the case, it is my second preference that the government merely and mechanically registers/deregisters any two or more people who wish to declare themselves "married", without attaching any meaning to that word, because making a marriage meaningful can only be up to the people involved in that marriage.

If a man and a woman can arbitrarily declare themselves legally "married" in order to obtain certain privileges, even if they are obviously incompatible, even if they dislike the smell of each other, even if they share nothing, even if they never went to bed together, then why not a man with a man or a woman with a woman?

<<If a man and a woman can arbitrarily declare themselves legally "married" in order to obtain certain privileges, even if they are obviously incompatible, even if they dislike the smell of each other, even if they share nothing, even if they never went to bed together, then why not a man with a man or a woman with a woman?>>

Hey, I like it.

If heterosexuals can have sham marriages why can't homosexuals have sham marriages?

Priceless!

Dear Yuyutsu,
Thanks for your explanations. 

Your view of marriage seems to be anything it all, however the people involved would want to define it. I see this type of 'anything goes' approach as a dissolution of the sacred union that marriage was intended to be. Perhaps I'm too much of an idealist.

This view is typical of the modernist who craves absolute freedom at every turn, at any cost. I don't share this view of freedom.    

Your last paragraph is especially disconcerting  You argue from the viewpoint of abuse of the system. Of course, any system can be open to abuse. But once the institution itself is destroyed, there will be no more system to abuse.

When we are free to define marriage however we care to choose, I can imagine the results: polygamy, tick, okay; same sex marriage, tick, okay; 16 year old bunked up with his 22 year old high school English teacher (yes, I watched the Rake episode on ABC last night), yep, tick, then where next?

Several ladies living in a flat, declaring themselves one big happy family so they can get a rent reduction, okay.

A netball team living together declaring themselves to be each other's co-wives, with their coach as the designated master of the harem. If it saves on petrol costs for transport on match days, and on the laundry bill, then who are we to discriminate?    

     

Dear Dan,

Perhaps my last paragraph was an exaggeration, so to clear a point, but there are many couples today who are formally married, and who do fulfil the minimum LEGAL requirements as to legally not be considered a sham-marriage, yet their lives do not resemble anything like a truly sacred union. Likewise, I personally know [heterosexual-]couples who are not formally married, yet their lives exemplify a sacred union.

Whether laws stay or change, the various activites that you mentioned occur anyway. Even if people are immoral, it is neither possible nor the goverment's duty to set them straight - how much more so when they are immoral themselves!

Nevertheless, God will eventually clear-up this mess.

You have a right to your views, but I think that as a religious person, you should care even more about freedom from secular governments, because they have the power to take away your religious rights (and some among the Labor/Greens would be delighted to do so).

Have you ever heard this saying:

"When the Nazis took the dissidents away, I did nothing because I kept quiet and it did not affect me.
When the Nazis took the Gypsies away, I did not stop them because I was not a Gypsy and it did not affect me.
When the Nazis took the Jews away, I did not stop them because I was not a Jew and it did not affect me.
Then the Nazis came to take to take ME away and there was no one left to stop them."?

So among those ticks you mentioned, I also tick: "sacred, monogamous heterosexual union, sanctified at a religious rite by a priest in church: tick, okay; celibacy: tick, okay".

Don't take your religious rights for granted - the Iranian government for example, currently presses young people to marry and have children, a celibate would find him/herself in trouble there.

I would fight just as fiercely against a government that forbids heterosexual marriages; or celibacy; or polygamy; or polyandry; or a government that denies religious rights and practices, even if not my own religion.

Dear Yuyutsu,
I have heard of that saying. I don't think it necessary to apply it here. If the government doesn't want to elevate those of same sex union to the status of marriage, that is not the same as dragging people away to their doom, as in the tale of Nazi oppression. What the gays are requesting is a redefinition of marriage.  

I can't ever see the government giving celebates marriage status either. To suggest celebates should have marriage status shows what flight of fancy we are embarking upon.