As old Groucho remarked, “I don’t care to belong to a club that accepts people like me as members.” And my prejudice is now fully justified by the very idea that the word ‘marriage’ might be misused/re-interpreted/ hijacked to include seeking supernatural approval for conjoining ‘members’ of the same gender (Gerrit? Sorry, Vicar).
Boadicea's Chariot 
So I might find a stall selling conjoined jumpers or cardigans?
PapaG, cottaging can be a cold pastime! 🙂
Ha! Another cup of tea vicar?
I do hope that individual clergymen will be free to refuse to conduct this travesty of a wedding service. These “gay” characters continue to thrust their life style in our faces in an attempt to prove they are as “good as you” and thereby fail miserably. We have friends who have been living quietly and happily together for years with no fuss, no ceremony, no wedding dresses. They are as good as we are.
I have two homosexual friends – that I know about, of course. One is a hairy-assed Scot who did 26 years in the Army whom I’ve known since training. The other is chairman of the local UKIP branch. Both are in long-term relationships. (And both are aware of my distaste for homosexuality. We’re still friends.) You should hear their views on the prancing luvvies who are making all this fuss.
I cannot claim that ‘some of my best friends are gay’ but I have known and liked several gay men over the years whose lifestyle is dignified and ‘as good as anybody else’s’.
Unfortunately it’s the less dignified examples who do injustice to their preferences.
I have no problems with long-term same-gender relationships having the same legal / financial rights as long-term different-gender relationships. But, I don’t think they should have the right to adopt children.
I don’t care if same-gender couples are given the right to register their relationships – I’m quite sure that the legal fraternity will be as happy to resolve the problems of the breakdown of those relationships as they are to sort out the affairs of different-gender divorces!
I don’t have any difficulty with any Religion being willing to ‘bless’ such unions – as some, in recent years, have decided to ‘bless’ the marriages of divorcees – although I doubt if the Catholics, the Jews or the Muslims would be prepared to do so
However, and it is a huge, big HOWEVER – I am heartily sick of having to change the definition of words that have, since time immemorial, had a specific meaning. Marriage has a clearly defined meaning and it does not mean the union or conjunction of two people of the same sex – let them find another word.
I agree with most of what you said Boa, except for the legal/financial benefit. If it apples to homosexuals, it should apply to any couple or group of people who commit to living together and supporting each other. Why should not members of the same family, 3 siblings say, avoid death duties and transfer taxes in the same way the those in a civil partnership do? Why does the fact these people engage in sexual activity make them more deserving of tax breaks? Why is a couple more deserving than a threesome or foursome? Why can a homosexual have access to the medical records of his partner but a sibling/nephew/niece/offspring etc. may not?
The whole thing is a travesty. Either the traditional institution of marriage ideemed to be of value to society and is thus upheld or it is not and should be abandoned completely. Civil partnerships and gay marriage are absurd corruptions. The whole debate serves as distraction from more pressing matters that governments are unable or unwilling to address.
In my view marriage should be left to religious institutions. If a Unitarian Universalist church wishes to conduct same-sex marriages so be it. If the Catholic church prefers eating its own eye balls to conducting them so be it. The state should not have involved itself with this to begin with past accepting registered partnerships.
Bravo and Janus – you sum it up beautifully with the words “prancing luvvies” and “less dignified”.
Boadicea, how about the word “horriage”? Or perhaps “queeriage”?
Sheona, queeriage may be a bit too similar to peerage and lead to confusion. Er, on second thoughts, no; it’s fine! 🙂
Outage?
OZ
OZ: Roughage?
LW
Rearage?
Janus – you missed a trick; Surely it should be a Cottage?
🙂