But there are a lot of basic legal protections (just in case something happens) that homosexual couples don’t have access to. It would be fine if there were other ways to attain them, but how, when a government marriage is the only game in town?

I personally support letting gays marry legally, but I would greatly prefer that the government get out of the business altogether. Churches could distribute marriage contracts (and they would be free to choose which couples to distribute to). But other private organizations could also join the market, giving couples the opportunity to choose which set of protections would suit their relationship the best. And, though some may not like it, niche providers could even draft the contracts for polygamous relationships (a new boom industry for Utah? heh). All contracts would be legal in the court of law, just like any other contract.

Almost everything the government gets its hands into, it messes up. It politicizes issues, divides the people, and is terribly inefficient to boot. Marriage as a government program is a failure, given the divorce rates in this country. In addition, I find it offensive that the government offers monetary incentives to get married. Especially if it’s toward subsidizing a social goal. Shouldn’t cementing the eternal love you share with another be the one and only reason for marriage? Call me a old-fashioned, call me a romantic idealist, but call me anything other than a social engineer.

Then, government should stay out of marriage altogether and leave it up to individual churches. How very libertarian of you.

Somehow, though, I don’t think that’s the point you were trying to make. And I am not a libertarian (well, not at least as most “libertarians” define the word), so let’s leave that behind and get back to the question.

The argument about marriage equality that you’re making rests on a faulty assumption - that the government recognizes an individual marriage because of the morality or goodness or whatever of the individual relationship. To encourage people to pursue their happiness, one might say. And no rational person would argue that someone is less entitled to the pursuit of happiness because of who they are sexually attracted to.

But, my friend, that’s not the issue. The government doesn’t really care if by granting a marriage license to me it’s giving me a way to express my happiness.

The government recognizes and subsidizes marriage because marriage 1) provides a mass social framework that allows for the raising of children in two-parent homes with both a male and a female influence and 2) provides a mass social framework in which individual men protect individual women (who are generally physically the weaker sex) and individual women make sure individual men (who are generally the more idiotic sex) don’t do anything too stupid. This saves the government from having to do all the safety and police work itself. (You’ll pardon me for being unbearably traditional and generalizing in my views of the sexes.)

And the reason why two people of the same sex don’t qualify for this governmental recognition is because - at least in the eyes of society today - a relationship between two individuals of the same sex does not fulfill those two criteria. Both are up for debate, of course, and incidentally I think the strongest argument for gay marriage is that it does provide social stability. The whole “marriage tames men [and women, in this case]” argument.

If there’s no societal benefit, there’s no reason for the government to incentivize a behavior. Gay marriage advocates have got to convince the government that there is a societal benefit if they want to get anywhere. Talking about equality and the “freedom to marry” is a non-starter.

And I know this is running long but I’ll address your other two points really quickly.

“…while people were out there claiming that they believed the government should not be supporting interracial marriages in a similar fashion to your statement that the government should not expand recognized marriages to inlcude same-sex couples.”

No, because given the two reasons government recognizes marriage that I listed above, an interracial marriage is no different from an intraracial marriage. Anti-miscegenation laws were attempts by racist idiots to preserve “racial purity” and had nothing to do with whether or not a particular marriage was beneficial to society. Racism and homophobia are both terrible things. However, there actually is a non-homophobic case against gay marriage; if there’s a non-racist argument against interracial marriage, I’ve yet to hear it. So let’s dispense with this analogy, shall we?

“In allowing a government to determine which relationships are recognized and which aren’t, we are giving the gov too much power.”

No, quite frankly, we’re not. Marriage, as we’re discussing it, is recognized by - guess who - the government. For the purposes of this discussion, marriage is a government program. If the government has a program, it can set requirements for who qualifies for that program.

As I’ve said before, if the government interferes with our rights to enter into consensual relationships with whomever we want, then I’ll be out there with you protesting it. But don’t mistake the fact that some relationships qualify for government recognition for an inherent right to have a relationship recognized by the government.

You are right in that Anti-Sodomy laws were a clear example of the government making certain adult actions illegal unjustly. But you are wrong about marriage equality not being a similar situation.

The government has exerted its power to allow only heterosexual relationships to be recognized to the detriment of gay relationships. It was only a generation ago that the Supreme Court declared that laws forbidding racial intermarriage was unconstitutional while people were out there claiming that they believed the government should not be supporting interracial marriages in a similar fashion to your statement that the government should not expand recognized marriages to inlcude same-sex couples.

In allowing a government to determine which relationships are recognized and which aren’t, we are giving the gov too much power.

Aw shit (no pun intended).

Anyway, the whole thing about “freedom lost” out of California or in California.

Since we live in an oligarchal/democratic society, and we all have the freedom to vote, it’s impossible for “freedom” as a whole to lose.

Sure, individual freedoms can be lost, but only because we have exercised our majority rule freedom to restrict individual rights.

If anything really “lost” this election, it was whatever the opposite of apathy is. Because apathy totally pwned all the special interests:P