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June 28, 2015 8:00am by Kokila Patel

General Debate 28 June 2015

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General Debate

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wellygirl

Fletch, I did read that post, interestingly written by a man. Biology means that women are only able to get pregnant up until a certain age, that means that ‘in principle’ not every woman can get pregnant.

Men can continue to procreate into old age, women cannot, that means once a woman is past childbearing age then there is no possibility of procreation in the marriage – so therefore when you say only a marriage with the possibility of procreation is a marriage, then you are saying a woman who has no possibility of having children will not have a real marriage if she marries after her childbearing years are past.
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June 28, 2015 3:09pm
wellygirl

Penny, the Government’s mandate is that they won the election, their social housing policy clearly stated that they would move the provision of community housing to social housing providers, if you missed this maybe next election you could spend a little more time reading up on the policies of the parties involved in the election, and a little less time on accusations of corruption.
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June 28, 2015 3:17pm
publicwatchdog

Wellygirl – I prefer to give a considered opinion, based upon having researched and investigated the issues?

My time is limited and I choose to prioritise that which I ‘put my mind to’ – as it were.

So – although I’m very flattered that you are seeking my opinion on a range of matters, I prefer, at this stage, not to engage.

Kind regards

Penny Bright
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June 28, 2015 3:18pm
thedavincimode

Wellygirl – I prefer to give a considered opinion, based upon having researched and investigated the issues?

My time is limited and I choose to prioritise that which I ‘put my mind to’ – as it were.

Translation: buggar, she’s nailed me yet again
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June 28, 2015 3:20pm
Jack5

Stephiegirl at 11.15 posted the following after I criticised him/her for yet again tackling Manolo because of Manolo’s ethnicity”:

Jack 5, what racist mark ?

~~Man up~~ Front up, Stephiegirl and apologise to Manolo.

Stephiegirl also threw this question to me out of the blue:

And what are your solutions in combating ISIS etc? How will say deporting our 50,000 Muslims help ?

That’s a good idea, well done Stephiegirl. If you are a Muslim, however, you will be on the first plane.
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June 28, 2015 3:27pm
wellygirl

Penny, that is a cop out. Not all of the issues I raised require detailed research or investigation, many are based in opinion.

Do you have any opinions of your own? Or do you need to find out what the correct lefty PC opinion should be before expressing it? Is that what you mean by investigation and research? Making sure you are thinking in the correct PC lefty way?

but to help you out, here is one you should be able to respond to though, as I believe you have done extensive research and investigation on this – How obscene do you think it is that a young women is harassed and bullied by an older white man who is paternalistically bringing a court case on her behalf she does not want?
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June 28, 2015 3:34pm
Dennis Horne

wellygirl. Far be it for me to step between a bachelor girl and a Christian, but there is always a problem with definitions. There are nearly always exceptions.

Naturally a marriage between old people will not be the same as a marriage between young people. And nobody is saying a marriage between a man and a woman that does not bear children is not a marriage. Young, old and in-between.

What we are doing is describing the features of marriage. Without copulation and reproduction we would never have bothered with the concept or the institution. But in the general case marriage concerns sex between men and women, and sex between men and women produces children. Not in every case. But exceptions don’t make definitions.

So what we do is, we make some generalisations and then make the lines fuzzy.

In my case I cannot make the lines fuzzy enough around marriage to include homosexual acts.

I think the concept of marriage is far too important to society to be playing silly buggers.
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June 28, 2015 3:34pm
publicwatchdog

errrr….. Wellygirl – I’ve just googled and found the 2014 National Party election policies.

On housing – there is no mention of ‘their social housing policy clearly stated that they would move the provision of community housing to social housing providers’ ?

Perhaps you could provide a link to substantiate that your above-mentioned statement was actually National’s stated 2014 election policy on housing, as opposed to something you just ‘made up’?

You see Wellygirl, why I prefer ‘informed’ debate – where people base their opinions on facts and evidence – which they can substantiate?

Penny Bright
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June 28, 2015 3:35pm
MT_Tinman

Dennis Horne (3,341 comments) says:
June 28th, 2015 at 3:06 pm

1. Is the special relationship between men and women, which in the general case concerns copulation and the care of any offspring, commonly called marriage, of any great significance to society?

Dennis, that is two questions.

A large number of societies have not related child care to marriage. Marriage was for breeding with those societies, often, giving child care to others – mostly women too old to do the breeding.

Sometimes child care was the responsibility of the whole group.

Of course, many other societies did not have what is described here as marriage with females relegated to breeders and drudges available to the strongest male who wanted them.

I have no doubt in some societies the roles were reversed (except of course the child bearing).

History tells us that god-botherers over the ages were no different from others as far as these definitions are concerned.

England for instance, as little as 150 years ago, had large sections of society that differentiated sex, marriage and child rearing.
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June 28, 2015 3:46pm
wellygirl

Well of course you won’t find it if you just looked for housing policy – try social housing policy, you know, under social policy.

It is your issue if you can’t find it Penny, not mine. The fact that you are a) google-challenged and unable to locate the policy and b) were uninformed at the last election is not my problem. I am not very much inclined to provide a link especially as you have not been too inclined to answer any questions that have been put to you on this blog.
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June 28, 2015 3:47pm
nasska

Dennis

As someone above mooted, the history of marriage owes far more to property than progeny. During the Dark Ages marriage was recorded by the church but only because they held a monopoly on literacy. Nobility had lands & titles to bequeath & blood lines were considered important.

Less so for the peasantry who frequently just “shacked up” & got on with their lives without the doubtful blessings of priest or paper.

If you’re still interested have a read of http://merryfarmer.net/2011/11/marriage-and-sex-in-the-middle-ages/ & let’s discuss what you think they’ve got wrong.
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June 28, 2015 3:54pm
Dennis Horne

MT_Tinman. How has the institution of marriage functioned or been deemed to function in this country, amongst the Europeans, since say, 1840? In particular, how did the breeding occur in your family: brought up by parents living together?
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June 28, 2015 4:00pm
Dennis Horne

nasska. Shacking up is still marriage, common law marriage.

At no time has any kind of marriage by any definition and for whatever goal included homosexual acts.

And you know perfectly well our breeding ‘programme’ is a shambles.
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June 28, 2015 4:04pm
wellygirl

Dennis,

I personally don’t want to get in the middle of the debate on marriage, mainly because I have no strong views of marriage one way or the other, I am very much of the opinion live and let live when it comes to personal relationships. As long as people are happy then who am I to judge their situation.

The point I was trying to make (perhaps not very clearly) was about the wording Fletch used, and the interpretation that marriage that involves a woman past her child bearing age is not a real marriage
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June 28, 2015 4:05pm
stephieboy

Jackie 5 , is till find it rather bizarre and ironic that one person of an identifiable ethnic origin disses out against others of same But this time I will let it go and move on .

Yes its good that we condemn the Tunisian massacre but its also helpful to bring constructive ideas and solutions to the table. This Manolo and it appears you don’t with both your tedious simplistic mantras !
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June 28, 2015 4:07pm
Shawn Herles

Watching the total destruction of Reid’s arguments and credibility on this thread is certainly entertaining! 🙂
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June 28, 2015 4:07pm
Pete George

In particular, how did the breeding occur in your family: brought up by parents living together?

In my wider family it has occurred probably like it has during human history, with or without marriage, but with a range of partnering and parenting arrangements.

Of my children’s generation there is:
1 married couple rearing children in one home
1 unmarried couple rearing children in one home (but it hasn’t always been so)
1 separated married couple rearing a child in separate homes
2 unmarried

There’s more complex living, marital and parenting arrangements amongst nieces and nephews.

None of this has anything to do with homosexuality and nor is it affected by homosexuality as far as I’m aware.
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June 28, 2015 4:08pm
All_on_Red

Reid
I have about 1500 hours in light fixed wing and rotary. Which isn’t a lot compared to most. One day I went out to Pakuranga and had a go in the Boeing 737 Simulator they had there. After a bit of flying around I managed to fly it UNDER the Auckland Harbour bridge without hitting it. It was probably more luck than skill but shows they are easier than you think to place.( the check list is hell though).
Why don’t you have a go and see whether you can hit the Sky Tower. Let us know how you get on.
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June 28, 2015 4:12pm
nasska

Dennis

I was responding to “I think the concept of marriage is far too important to society to be playing silly buggers.” & comments you & others have made in the same vein.

If marriage often didn’t exist, other than by default in the case of ‘common law marriage’, then how on earth is it such a big deal who gets married now? The whole concept of marriage has been demonstrated to be continually evolving & therefore only a construct of society at a particular point of time.
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June 28, 2015 4:12pm
Shawn Herles

“Where’s the electorate mandate for the privatisation of State housing via ‘social housing’ Wellygirl?”

It’s called an election Penny, the one National won and you and your fellow travelers lost.

By the way, National’s social housing policy is right here, on their web site. Took me less than 5 seconds to find it.

https://www.national.org.nz/policies/social-housing

Game. Set. Match.
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June 28, 2015 4:13pm
Pete George

Shacking up is still marriage, common law marriage.

That’s not the sort of traditional marriage some people claim we’ve always had and must retain as some perfect arrangement.

If shacking up is still marriage then that applies to couples regarding of their sexuality? What if cousins or siblings or multiple partners shack up, surely they can’t be common law marriage.
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June 28, 2015 4:14pm
Dennis Horne

wellygirl. yes, I understand that. I absolutely support civil unions for homosexuals having the same protection of the law as marriage confers. I object only to calling it marriage.

Anyway, it doesn’t matter. It’s happened. If people don’t understand what marriage means to society it’s too late. The mess will just get bigger.
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June 28, 2015 4:14pm
nasska

So if we struck the word “marriage’ from the lexicons of Western society & called it an “espousal” you’d be okay with that Dennis?

If so your total objection is the arrangement of the letters a, e, g, i, m & r.
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June 28, 2015 4:19pm
Shawn Herles

“I absolutely support civil unions for homosexuals having the same protection of the law as marriage confers. I object only to calling it marriage.”

Agreed.
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June 28, 2015 4:19pm
Maggy Wassilieff

There is more than one type of special relationship between man and woman that concerns copulation and the raising of children.
for instance:

rape
or
a one-night stand.

Neither are uncommon in this day and age, nor were they uncommon historically.

Somehow children from these types of unions were raised, with or without a marriage contract being involved.
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June 28, 2015 4:33pm
Manolo

Greek meltdown: http://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2015-06-27/greeks-line-up-at-banks-and-drain-atms-after-tsipras-calls-vote
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June 28, 2015 4:40pm
Johnboy

I always knew there would be no queers in your family PG! 🙂
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June 28, 2015 4:46pm
Peter

Reid, you’ve been had, mate.

My friend flies for AirNZ. I asked him about it, and he said he could show me how to do it in an hour.

I’ve never flown a plane.
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June 28, 2015 4:48pm
Shawn Herles

“Reid, you’ve been had, mate.”

If it appears on a conspiracy web site, a Kremlin controlled “news” source, or an anti-Jewish site, Reid switches his brain off and just swallows whatever he reads, hook, line and sinker.

And no amount of real evidence and facts will sway him.

Remember this the next time he lies and claims merely to be a “truthseeker.”
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June 28, 2015 4:51pm
Pete George

Researchers at the University of Tasmania analysed surveys taken from 14 countries and found 13 percent of those surveyed in New Zealand were climate-change sceptics.

http://www.radionz.co.nz/news/national/277400/13-percent-of-nzers-climate-change-skeptics

It depends on the survey wording and the meaning of sceptic here. I’m sceptical about some aspects of ‘Climate Change’ but acknowledge it’s an issue of concern and it’s backed by substantial science.

• Climate scepticism is highest in Australia, New Zealand, Norway and the USA.

• Higher levels of CO2 emissions per capita are positively associated with scepticism.

• Country vulnerability to climate change is correlated positively with climate scepticism.

• Political conservatism, gender and low environmental concern are key predictors of scepticism.

http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0959378015000758

13% is still a smallish minority. Some people will never accept reality if it differs from their fixed views.
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June 28, 2015 4:56pm
Pete George

Not so JB. In one family of cousins 4/4 males.
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June 28, 2015 4:58pm
mikenmild

• Political conservatism, gender and low environmental concern are key predictors of scepticism.

Reality has a well-known liberal bias.
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June 28, 2015 5:00pm
Dennis Horne

No reason to outlaw bestiality. No consent? Nonsense. We don’t ask sheep, “Please may I slit your throat?” Sure a sheep would rather spent the night in Johnboy’s bunk than end up on his barbecue.

What about paedophilia? It feels normal to paedophiles. Good too. I mean, must be, you can’t stop them. This age of consent is arbitrary, isn’t it. Used to be 12. Some countries it doesn’t exist, just have to get married. Why don’t we expand our definition too? That would solve the problem.
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June 28, 2015 5:05pm
OneTrack

Manolo – “Greek meltdown”

Didn’t Tsipras promise that he would sort the problem out using socialism, with no austerity required, and that is why he got voted in? Now he is reneging on the deal and is going to get the Greeks to vote again for some reason.
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June 28, 2015 5:06pm
Shawn Herles

“Reality has a well-known liberal bias.”

A lion eating it’s prey is not concerned for the rights of it’s food.

Reality has a reality bias.
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June 28, 2015 5:07pm
Manolo

Comrade Tsipras could be toast soon and the lazy Greeks will have to work hard for a while before the situation stabilises. The domino effect of the Grexit is unknown.
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June 28, 2015 5:11pm
Johnboy

I bet they are Southlanders PG! 🙂
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June 28, 2015 5:15pm
Johnboy

Speaking of Southlanders shall we say Hurricanes 42. Highlanders 15? 🙂
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June 28, 2015 5:17pm
Pete George

We shall say it should be a bloody good game, but beyond that anything could happen. Hurricanes have to be favourites but a final is a one off chance for either team regardless of what’s happened through the season.
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June 28, 2015 5:20pm
Johnboy

Let’s have a sweep on KB. I’ve stated my score? 🙂
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June 28, 2015 5:22pm
Psycho Milt

I’m talking about things that occur in Nature and which man has had no hand in creating.

Given that marriage doesn’t fit those criteria, no you’re not. Pair-bonding occurs in nature, but humans are not pair-bonding animals, we’re highly promiscuous – which is one of the reasons we created “marriage” in the first place. You might be tempted to leap on that reason as being the very one you’re obsessed with – ie, our interest in providing a stable environment for raising children, because the length of time it takes them to develop to adulthood is highly incompatible with our natural promiscuity – but marriage as a codified institution in the sense you’re thinking of it was brought into existence mainly as a matter of property rights, ie to improve the likelihood that the child a man passes his property to is actually his.
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June 28, 2015 5:23pm
Johnboy

“I’ve never flown a plane.”

Start with a kite Peter! 🙂
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June 28, 2015 5:26pm
Brigitte

I heard this a few years back but seems as good a time as any to bring it back out….

Two Otago boys die and are sent to Hell. They seem to be enjoying themselves which upsets the Devil. So he turns the heat right up. Yup, even the lava is bubbling away nicely. But the two Otago boys seem pretty happy, telling the Devil that “it’s nice to have some warmth for a change”.

The Devil doesn’t like this so turns the heat off completely. Everywhere turns to ice in the freezing conditions. He returns later and is surprised to see that not only are the two lads happy but they are whooping and high-fiving to boot.

He asks them how they could be so happy in the freezing cold. One replies:

“Well Hell has frozen over so that can only mean one thing…..that the Highlanders have won the Super 15”
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June 28, 2015 5:31pm
Johnboy

I’m available to let you have my babies Brigitte! 🙂

ps: are you French? 🙂
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June 28, 2015 5:34pm
Pete George

Funny Brigitte but, ah, neither the Highlanders nor the Hurricanes have won before. One good thing that’s guaranteed is a new champion.
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June 28, 2015 5:42pm
SGA

Johnboy at 5:34 pm

ps: are you French? 🙂

Do you think Brigitte might be able to introduce you to a friendly Lacaune or Charmoise?
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June 28, 2015 5:55pm
Shawn Herles

“which is one of the reasons we created “marriage” in the first place.”

As far as we can tell from history, marriage has always existed. There is thus no evidence that marriage is a human creation. Regulations concerning marriage can be seen in history, but no point at which we can say “there, that is when marriage was created.”

Thus the claim is purely ideological, in this case liberal-secular ideology.
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June 28, 2015 5:57pm
Fifi la Belle

Et moi, Johnboy? Je t’attend, mon cheri.
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June 28, 2015 5:58pm
Reid

marriage as a codified institution in the sense you’re thinking of it was brought into existence mainly as a matter of property rights, ie to improve the likelihood that the child a man passes his property to is actually his.

So it didn’t exist in societies where most people were serfs PM?

Really?

Are you sure?
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June 28, 2015 6:05pm
SGA

Shawn Herles at 5:57 pm

As far as we can tell from history, marriage has always existed.

Well… arrangements similar to those we call marriage appear early in the development of many cultures?
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June 28, 2015 6:07pm
Dennis Horne

There was an old ewe called Brigitte
Who used to make Johnboy fidget
He put her to bed
After he fed
Her stories that bored her frigid

With apologies to Brigitte.
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June 28, 2015 6:09pm
Shawn Herles

“Well… arrangements similar to those we call marriage appear early in the development of many cultures?”

Yes, in a sense. Marriage is always there in one form or another. And I do mean always, they don’t just appear at some point we can discern.

There may be variations on the theme, but the theme is universal.
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June 28, 2015 6:11pm
SGA

Shawn Herles at 5:07 pm

A lion eating it’s prey is not concerned for the rights of it’s food.

Besides which the lionesses probably did all the work 🙂
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June 28, 2015 6:11pm
SGA

Shawn Herles at 6:11 pm

Yes, in a sense. Marriage is always there in one form or another. And I do mean always,

From my perspective (which differs from yours), there was a time when such arrangements didn’t exist. I’m more cautious about absolute statements too (burned too many times in the past), because someone who actually knows something about anthropology will point out groups X, Y, and Z who had far more casual arrangements than what we would normally think of as “marriage”.
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June 28, 2015 6:16pm
Shawn Herles

“who have far more casual arrangements than what we would normally think of as “marriage”.”

They will still have arrangements.

My point though was really about the idea that we created marriage. But we can’t discern that from history, only the regulations can be. It may be true, it may not be. Thus what people believe is about personal belief rather than history or science.
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June 28, 2015 6:18pm
SGA

Shawn Herles at 6:18 pm

They will still have arrangements.
My point though was really about the idea that we created marriage. But we can’t discern that from history, only the regulations can be.

I guess it depends on at what point do those arrangements meet our criteria for marriage?
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June 28, 2015 6:22pm
Fifi la Belle

Why are people trying to define marriage by invoking exceptions.

There has always been a special relationship between men and women. We wouldn’t be here otherwise. It may have included what we now call rape. Some women bore children which needed to be looked after or they died. No doubt some were killed. Other adults and older children might have helped with the upbringing, but normal men don’t show much interest in other men’s children.

Some men would have had preferences. These were the forerunner of wives.

Whatever. Would we be better off if men and women made a commitment to each other and looked after their own kids, restricting the number to that they could afford, and raising them to be independent and useful members of society? YES/NO

Okay, I know I’m describing an ideal. So? Are we to have no standards in society? Looks like it. Anything goes, eh.
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June 28, 2015 6:29pm
Reid

This was recommended on the radio this week as being the absolute best doco series on WWI and it’s all on YouTube. According to the guy who was discussing it, this series is the one which gave birth to such magnificence as The Second World War narrated by Olivier. This one’s narrated by Redgrave.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fXhiagFG8KE
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June 28, 2015 6:30pm
Pete George

Marriage predates recorded history but that’s not the same as “Marriage is always there in one form or another. And I do mean always, they don’t just appear at some point we can discern.”

This shows howe much marriage has changed over recorded history: History of marriage – 13 facts (from Live Science)

1. Arranged alliances

Marriage is a truly ancient institution that predates recorded history. But early marriage was seen as a strategic alliance between families, with the youngsters often having no say in the matter. In some cultures, parents even married one child to the spirit of a deceased child in order to strengthen familial bonds.

2. Family ties

Keeping alliances within the family was also quite common. In the Bible, the forefathers Isaac and Jacob married cousins and Abraham married his half-sister. Cousin marriages remain common throughout the world, particularly in the Middle East.

3. Polygamy preferred

Monogamy may seem central to marriage now, but in fact, polygamy was common throughout history. From Jacob, to Kings David and Solomon, Biblical men often had anywhere from two to thousands of wives

4. Babies optional

In many early cultures, men could dissolve a marriage or take another wife if a woman was infertile. However, the early Christian church was a trailblazer in arguing that marriage was not contingent on producing offspring.

5. Monogamy established

Monogamy became the guiding principle for Western marriages sometime between the sixth and the ninth centuries.

6. Monogamy lite

Monogamous marriage was very different from the modern conception of mutual fidelity. Though marriage was legally or sacramentally recognized between just one man and one woman, until the 19th century, men had wide latitude to engage in extramarital affairs

7. State or church?

Marriages in the West were originally contracts between the families of two partners, with the Catholic Church and the state staying out of it.

8. Civil marriage

In the last several hundred years, the state has played a greater role in marriage.

9. Love matches

By about 250 years ago, the notion of love matches gained traction, meaning marriage was based on love and possibly sexual desire. But mutual attraction in marriage wasn’t important until about a century ago.

10. Market economics

Around the world, family-arranged alliances have gradually given way to love matches, and a transition from an agricultural to a market economy plays a big role in that transition.

Parents historically controlled access to inheritance of agricultural land. But with the spread of a market economy, “it’s less important for people to have permission of their parents to wait to give them an inheritance or to work on their parents’ land.”

11. Different spheres

Still, marriage wasn’t about equality until about 50 years ago. At that time, women and men had unique rights and responsibilities within marriage. For instance, in the United States, marital rape was legal in many states until the 1970s, and women often could not open credit cards in their own names, Coontz said. Women were entitled to support from their husbands, but didn’t have the right to decide on the distribution of community property. And if a wife was injured or killed, a man could sue the responsible party for depriving him of “services around the home,” whereas women didn’t have the same option.

12. Partnership of equals

By about 50 years ago, the notion that men and women had identical obligations within marriage began to take root. Instead of being about unique, gender-based roles, most partners conceived of their unions in terms of flexible divisions of labor, companionship, and mutual sexual attraction.

13. Gay marriage gains ground

Changes in straight marriage paved the way for gay marriage. Once marriage was not legally based on complementary, gender-based roles, gay marriage seemed like a logical next step.
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June 28, 2015 6:30pm
Psycho Milt

As far as we can tell from history, marriage has always existed. There is thus no evidence that marriage is a human creation.

In the unlikely event that I one day write a textbook on sophistry, I’ll be sure to use this fine example.

So it didn’t exist in societies where most people were serfs PM?

Serfs are a relatively recent invention, reid. Marriage has been around way longer than serfs. Nevertheless, it’s fair to say that until the Church got a stranglehold on marriage in the Middle Ages, serfs and everyone else with no property to speak of had no great interest in marriage as we’d recognise it.
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June 28, 2015 6:37pm
Scott

Marriage is always been between a man and a woman or a man married to some women. But never man and man or woman and woman. Marriage has always been in every society with no exceptions that have been found.
I actually believe in marriage. It’s a shame marriage has been hijacked by homosexuals, most of whom are not interested in marriage but just want to have their homosexuality affirmed. And it’s been hijacked by liberals who also don’t actually know or care about marriage and have no intention of getting married themselves.
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June 28, 2015 6:46pm
HB

oops, accidentally reported a comment (using a touch-screen). Sorry 🙁
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June 28, 2015 6:58pm
nasska

https://www.dropbox.com/s/ps4tgzumithhw4c/Godnutters%2034.jpeg?dl=0
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June 28, 2015 7:05pm
SGA

HB at 6:58 pm

oops, accidentally reported a comment (using a touch-screen). Sorry 🙁

Don’t worry we probably deserved it anyway 🙂
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June 28, 2015 7:06pm
Shawn Herles

Double check with DPF, but as far as I know the quick abuse report only gets noticed if there are several complaints, 5 I think. Hitting it once shouldn’t generate a complaint.
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June 28, 2015 7:26pm
Reid

Serfs are a relatively recent invention, reid. Marriage has been around way longer than serfs.

Yes I know PM. My point of that post being that your argument about marriage being related to property rights is thereby obviated.

Sorry you didn’t get it, I thought for a time you were one of the brainier lefties. Guess not.
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June 28, 2015 7:28pm
Shawn Herles

There are two forms of evolution. There is the actual science of evolution, and then there is Evolution as used by secular liberals. In it’s second form Evolution is just a substitute word for God when secular liberals can’t explain something.

Thus proving that we are all Godnutters! 😉
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June 28, 2015 7:33pm
Shawn Herles

“Marriage is always been between a man and a woman or a man married to some women. But never man and man or woman and woman. Marriage has always been in every society with no exceptions that have been found.”

Correct. Even in societies that were relatively ok with homosexual behavior, such as the Greeks and Romans, there was no homosexual marriage. Marriage has always been heterosexual, because anything else made no practical sense.
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June 28, 2015 7:36pm
nasska

….” your argument about marriage being related to property rights is thereby obviated.”….

Why’s that Reid? Marriage according to Shawn & few others has been around forever. Therefore it probably predates slaves, vassals, serfs, bondsmen & various other non entities.

It doesn’t in any way negate the argument that marriage was practised by the nobility to record the bloodline & facilitate succession of power & property. It filtered down the social ladder for sure but that was secondary to its main purpose.
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June 28, 2015 7:37pm
nasska

….”Thus proving that we are all Godnutters!”….

Speak for yourself! 🙂
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June 28, 2015 7:38pm
Shawn Herles

“slaves, vassals, serfs, bondsmen & various other non entities.”

Thats not very liberal of you nasska. My slaves are not non-entitities, they work very hard.
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June 28, 2015 7:39pm
Maggy Wassilieff

Look what all you young folk can look forward to when you tire of your human mate

http://www.livescience.com/1951-forecast-sex-marriage-robots-2050.html
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June 28, 2015 7:41pm
nasska

….”My slaves are not non-entitities, they work very hard”…..

You’re mistaken & they’re not slaves…..they’re zombies you’ve brainwashed to believe your hocus pocus. 🙂
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June 28, 2015 7:42pm
Shawn Herles

Why do I get the feeling that Japan is going to be a very lucrative market for robot wives.
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June 28, 2015 7:43pm
Shawn Herles

“..they’re zombies you’ve brainwashed to obey your hocus pocus.”

Sssh! Stop giving away all my secrets!
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June 28, 2015 7:45pm
nasska

Maggy

See if they’ve got a model with a low sex drive will you…..at my age too much action could kill me. 🙂
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June 28, 2015 7:48pm
Shawn Herles

Will robot wives become feminists and revolt?

Food for thought.

Could be a movie in that idea.
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June 28, 2015 7:51pm
Odakyu-sen

You guys….

Still, Japanese children’s cartoons have had robots as their heroes for over 40 years, so Japan is certainly prepared for the introduction of humanoid robots.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hlHrvQ7D5OU

With the labor shortage and aging Japanese population, robots could be the way for repetitive tasks.
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June 28, 2015 8:04pm
Griff

“Sex should be friendly. Otherwise stick to mechanical toys; it’s more sanitary.”
― Robert A. Heinlein
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June 28, 2015 8:07pm
Pete George

Some more history of marriages, as it relates to same-sex unions.

The history of many Native American, African and Asian cultures includes same-sex and transgender conjugal unions. But examples of formal religious ceremonies in which two men who love each other are solemnly wedded together for life can be found across Europe, throughout classical antiquity and until the end of the middle ages.

Such unions of sworn kinship or ritual brotherhood were entered into by kings and aristocrats, by comrades in arms, and by men in all sorts of other social contexts – in the 14th century, Chaucer described sworn brotherhood between merchants, monks, clerks, and even peasant farmers.

To “wed” another man in this way was to plight one’s troth, to covenant for life, to express the highest form of love that one person could for another.

Five hundred years ago:

In 1497, the 22-year-old apothecary Carlo di Berardo d’Antonio was fined and banished from Florence for living with the dyer Michele di Bruno da Prulli (also fined), who had “for many, many years kept him as his wife and in place of a wife”, and had made him swear in church, on the Bible, “to remain faithful to Michele in this sodomitical vice”, using essentially the same ritual as a heterosexual wedding.

Almost 100 years later, in Rome in 1578, a group of Portuguese men were burned at the stake for likewise “marrying each other and being joined together as husband and wife” openly in church.

A few people grizzling about it on Kiwiblog is is not quite as serious a repercussion.

For the last 400 years, the practice of same-sex marriage has been largely the preserve of women.

To begin with, this was a secretive and punishable matter. In medieval and Renaissance Europe, it was often not even possible for two women to live together independently: households were supposed to be headed by men.

Yet we know of a few 16th-century cases of women who disguised themselves as men and lived in marriage with other women. After 1600, as the Dutch scholars Rudolf Dekker and Lotte van de Pol discovered, examples of such “female husbands” become much easier to find, especially in England, Germany and Holland.

In Amsterdam in 1641, the middle-aged widow Trijntje Barents fell in love with 27-year-old Hendrickje Lamberts. Some time into their affair, Hendrickje began to dress as a man.

They were a settled couple, who wished they could legally marry. Other Dutch couples did just that. In the 1680s, Cornelia Gerritse van Breugel disguised herself as a man in order to wed her long-time lover, Elisabeth Boleyn, in an Amsterdam church.

And in England:

Such cases were even more common in 18th-century England. In the early 1730s, when both were in their late teens, Mary East and her girlfriend decided to move to London and make a life together as husband and wife. Mary put on male clothes and turned herself into “James How”. Everyone presumed they were married. Over the years, James was elected to almost every parish office: s/he served as the foreman of juries, on the night watch, as overseer of the poor. For more than three decades, they kept their secret, and lived as a married couple.

A London minister performed the wedding of Elizabeth Huthall and John Smith, “a little, short, fair, thin man, not above 5 foot”. Afterwards, he wrote “my clerk judged they were both women”, but they left as a legally married couple. “After marriage I almost could prove them both women,” runs yet another laconic cleric’s note, “the one was dressed as a man.” That pair, too, departed happily married.

(Bishops and legislators take note: same-sex marriages have already taken place within the Church of England.)

http://www.theguardian.com/books/2015/jan/23/-sp-secret-history-same-sex-marriage

So it’s hardly new – and marriage has never been a fixed in stone type of arrangement.
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June 28, 2015 8:08pm
Pete George

And it goes back much further in history.

Evidence exists that same-sex marriages were tolerated in parts of Mesopotamia and ancient Egypt. Artifacts from Egypt, for example, show that same-sex relationships not only existed, but the discovery of a pharaonic tomb for such a couple shows their union was recognized by the kingdom.

Meanwhile, accounts of the Israelites’ departure for Canaan include their condemnation of Egyptian acceptance of same-sex practice.

In actuality, same-sex marital practices and rituals are less known in Egypt compared to Mesopotamia, where documents exist for a variety of marital practices, including male lovers of kings and polyandry. None of the recorded laws of Mesopotamia, including the Code of Hammurabi, contain restrictions against same-sex unions despite the fact that marriages are otherwise well regulated.

Roman social customs are relatively well known, and same-sex unions existed as high in society as among Roman emperors. Roman statesman Cicero also documented legal rights of an individual within a same-sex marriage.

http://www.randomhistory.com/history-of-gay-marriage.html

Again same sex marriages are not exactly a modern concept, and marriage arrangements have varied enormously throughout recorded history.
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June 28, 2015 8:12pm
Shawn Herles

“Still, Japanese children’s cartoons have had robots as their heroes for over 40 years, so Japan is certainly prepared for the introduction of humanoid robots.”

The Japanese do have a great deal of enthusiasm for robots in general. Hence my assumption they would be a lucrative market.
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June 28, 2015 8:30pm
wellygirl

Things are looking very shaky for Greece, BBC have breaking news that the ECB is expected to end emergency lending to Greece today (Sunday).

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-33303105
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June 28, 2015 8:33pm
wellygirl

And here is a fuller story on this

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-33303304
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June 28, 2015 8:35pm
nasska

Keep up the research PG. Just be careful in case one of Skydaddy’s acolytes doesn’t put a hex on you & turn you into a pillar of salt. 🙂

Edit: We’ll keep Shawn on standby to sort out an exorcism should you need one.
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June 28, 2015 8:46pm
SPC

The ECB action is of a design to intimidate the Greek public before they vote in their referendum.

Demonstrating why the UK will never join the euro zone and why it may choose to leave the EU and just have a free trade deal.

While the German bankers will never stand up to the Russians, they will exert hegemony within the Euro zone.
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June 28, 2015 8:48pm
wiseowl

I would urge every right thinking person to read the latest post on nzcpr .com that explains what appalling undemocratic,unjust,racist, just unbelievable joke that Finlayson has launched on the people of Hawkes Bay that treats ratepayers and taxpayers with utter contempt.

Totally lost for words and if Key condones this move then New Zealanders need to move heaven and earth to stop this shocking legislative move.
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June 28, 2015 8:48pm
Fletch

“How many legs does a dog have if you call the tail a leg? Four. Calling a tail a leg doesn’t make it a leg.” ~ Abraham Lincoln.
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June 28, 2015 9:26pm
Dennis Horne

Pete George. So some women dressed as men fooled the system and ‘married’ other women.

There is a precedent for allowing same-sex marriage after all. Room on another bandwagon for you, Pete.

Remember the “Carry On … ” films?
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June 28, 2015 11:15pm
Manolo

Communist government in retreat. The day of reckoning: http://www.cnbc.com/id/102793985

Despite a tweet from Greek Finance Minister Yanis Varoufakis that his government “opposed the very concept” of any controls, Greek Prime Minister Alexis Tsipras said later Sunday that he had forced the country’s central bank to recommend a bank holiday and capital controls.
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June 29, 2015 6:28am
Pete George

Dennis – you picked one example out of many looking at several thousand years of history and even that one shows ‘the system’ knowingly allowing same-sex church marriage.

The only bandwagon left is a futile lament – haven’t you noticed that marriage equality is a done deal here? And the sky seems to have remained up there where it always was.
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June 29, 2015 6:57am
Dennis Horne

Pete George. Yes, Pete, it’s a done deal. And no, the sky hasn’t fallen in. Not for me. But it was never about me. It was about the children whose sky will fall in, as, instead of reminding parents their duty, we make excuses for the misery they are about to unleash, with narcissistic humbug.

Because marriage is no longer an ideal, a serious commitment, steeped in sacrifice. It’s just a fairy fairytale.

The reason the redefinition has occurred is simple. Marriage had lost its importance. Too hard. Take the easy route — or root.
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June 29, 2015 8:38am

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