Showing posts with label marriage. Show all posts

One day while Ian and I were trading remarks back and forth via email, I made the comment "Welcome to My World!" He immediately replied and told me that would be a great title for a post. He even gave me some really solid ideas on what to post about. So I think that today is fitting for a glimpse into My World!

My world basically revolves around my family....My boys are constantly doing or saying something that keeps me thinking, or blushing, or pulling my hair out. I understand that it's their job to put dad into an early grave, and I have to say that normally they do a pretty good job. Now usually it's my two younger boys that come up with the questions that make you go Hmmm? (remember Arsenio?) Not today though. Today it was my 17 year old.

He and I had a discussion about this new federal law that will allow same sex couples to have the same benefits as hetero couples. It's all a crock though. It is really the federal government saying that if you are unmarried and together you can have the benefits of a married couple because they extended those same benefits to unmarried straight couples too. That's not the point of the story though.

I asked my son what he thought about it. He explained to me that he doesn't see why anybody would need to get married anymore. I felt that this was a prime opportunity for me to impart some fatherly advice on my oldest. So I asked if he thought marriage was just to get benefits. "Of course not" he said. "It's also for tax purposes." Jaw dropped. I asked him if it had anything to do with love or God? "I guess so for some people, but most people just want the perks dad." My first reaction was to tell him how wrong he was. My second reaction was to think about it before telling him how wrong he was. It forced me to take a good hard look at my own marriage. I have always believed I am in love with my wife. Not for a second did I get married to get a tax break, or better benefits. I had to be fair though and look at my relationship objectively. So I asked oldest son if he thought that was why I got married? "Don't be dumb." (aren't kids great when they are being honest?) He proceeded to tell me that he didn't know why I ever married his mom, but he was sure that's not why I married his step mom. So after controlling my laughter I pressed on.

We went through the list. My parents, his aunts, his other grandparents, even my in-laws. He told me no at every turn. That was about the time the lights clicked on for him I think. He hadn't made the remark personal enough when he made it, but after he looked at his family he realized that maybe there are some people that get married for the "right" reasons. I was pretty proud of myself and gave a mental pat on the back for my ability to guide this young mind in the right direction.

As he was getting ready to leave, I asked him if he would ever consider marrying for anything but love. As he walked out the door he told me "No way." Then about ten steps later as he was rounding the flowerbed to head to the street he turned around and said, "Well maybe if she's rich." I took the mental pat back and just shook my head. Welcome to my world........

I have been reading too much from Ian I think. I normally don't make too many issues on here to cause any offense BUT I figured that today could be one of those days that maybe I will. So be warned now that I'm not gonna talk about butterflies and rainbows, but something with a little more bite to it.

Gay marriage is a huge controversy right now. Gay rights and civil rights in general seem to be coming to the front of the news more and more. My view on Gay marriage.....I'm against it...OK did you guys get done cussing at me yet? Let me also say that I'm against the idea of the Government sanctioning any marriage and that means heterosexual marriage as well. I don't think it's the right venue for marriage.

Marriage in my opinion is between you and the person you love and, if you so believe, in your God PERIOD......... I was raised to believe certain things and as I get older I question some of them, and make up my own mind whether I agree with it or not. I don't need a priest or a politician or a school teacher for that matter making those decisions for me. I don't think it's the place of the school to tell my child whether it's ok either. That's MY job.

I am gonna get pulled away from the point here (yet again). In my humble opinion if 2 people want to be together and recognized by the state as a couple it should indeed be a union. Don't call it a marriage, that one word seems to cause more damage than most. The purpose of people wanting this equality with marriage is for the benefits that come from the marriage. Marriage is a predominantly religious ceremony. A civil union on the other hand is not. It's what it suggests. That's the only place the state and our personal lives, who we love, who we live with, who we will leave our belongings with should come together.

I know people that are gay. It turns out I know a lot more gay people than I realized. Those that I've talked to don't care if it's the M for marriage tag they get as long as they get the same considerations from the Government that a heterosexual couple gets. In so far as that is concerned I agree. I don't have to agree with a homosexual lifestyle to agree that people should be treated the same.

For the record I'm conservative. I'm not Republican, but I am definitely conservative. I'm not an extremist, I don't care about BO's birth certificate, I don't believe in killing abortion doctors (I don't agree with abortion either BTW). So don't believe that all conservatives are crazy gun toting(nothing wrong with gun toting) bible thumping (or thumping the occasional bible) backward ass rednecks (ok maybe something wrong with that) that live in the hills and shoot every stranger that walks up to the militia HQ. Some of us are sensible thinking normal people that happen to believe that some things about our country are right. Don't get me wrong a bunch of things are not so good, but there isn't anything that we can't fix if we work at it a little bit.

I have come to notice there is a pretty diverse line of thinking in the blogosphere. I have also happened to notice that just because we don't all agree on everything doesn't mean that we don't still read stuff that others are writing and even find some common ground on so many issues. I think that gay marriage is the same as any other issue facing us, it just needs people with a level way of thinking to realize that there is a solution. The solution is not to yell at each other and resort to childish name calling. That's unfortunately the phase we seem to be in right now...

So holler and scream all you want, but just remember that the only way we get any of this resolved is to realize that everybody has the right to their own beliefs, but nobody has the right to force those beliefs down our throats. Both sides of this argument need to wise up (grow up) and realize that. Nobody is completely innocent or guilty in this argument. We just need to find a way to meet in the middle.

My 2 cents.... Your 2 cents are also most welcome :)