MP joins same sex marriage rebellion (From Thurrock Gazette)

What a vile man. He says there's "no place for prejudice" but dictating that couple X can get married but couple Y can only have a civil partnership IS prejudice.

There is no sensible argument against same sex marriage. All the myths have been debunked over and over again.

Neither the church not the government "own" marriage, it's just part of society, and society has evolved such that most people accept that not all couples have to consist of a man and a woman. So marriage must evolve also.

Religious arguments against same sex marriage are nonsense; marriage is defined in the bible as, among other things, "between a man and his rape victim " and "between one man and one woman and her slaves" but these definitions are ignored because the church recognises that society has evolved.

There is no threat to anyone's marriage. No threat to society. No threat to any family or child. No "overwhelming response against the plans", just a few very noisy bigots.

Denouncing anyone with the temerity to oppose these plans as "bigots" is, of course, one of this debate's most tedious and intellectually lazy features.

Nobody who has met Stephen Metcalfe would accept that he is "vile", much less a "bigot". There is a perfectly legitimate argument that says, quite simply, that the political class have no right to redefine marriage to include same-sex unions. Marriage is a traditional institution and has been the cornerstone of society for generations and I for one am not sure that it rests within the competency of this present Government to redefine its meaning for us all.

Many of us, who were perfectly comfortable supporting Civil Partnerships precisely because we AREN’T slavering homophones, nevertheless cannot support ‘gay marriage’ (and, frankly, all the pontificating, self-righteous hectoring from its proponents are doing little to sway me to their side). For a start, this has nothing to do with ‘equality’ and everything to do with hijacking language. A few people in the militant gay lobby (I say a few because, let’s not forget, a number of high-profile gay men are opposing gay marriage too – including journalist Andrew Pierce, Labour MP Ben Bradshaw and Tory MP Conor Burns – are they ‘bigots’ too?) are simply not satisfied with Civil Partnerships. They want the State to call it ‘marriage’.

Personally, I’ve reached the conclusion the State should get out of the ‘marriage’ business altogether. Leave marriage to the churches, mosques and synagogues and everyone register a ‘civil union’ separately. Then people can call their union whatever they want without dragging the State into it.

"We believe that the Government does not have a mandate to redefine marriage."

They also have not received a mandate to quasi privatise the NHS and state education. However that hasn't stopped Cam and co pushing through their dated ideologically driven "reforms"

They are only in power because the soon to be defunct Limp Dems, sold their principles for a minor role in an ineffective and nasty coalition.

Why can't these creepy freaks of nature crawl back into their public toilet cubicles and leave us alone.
Stop trying to re-define the English language!

Andrew Schrader - I couldn't agree more with...

'Leave marriage to the churches, mosques and synagogues and everyone register a ‘civil union’ separately. Then people can call their union whatever they want without dragging the State into it.'

Andrew Schrader wrote:
Denouncing anyone with the temerity to oppose these plans as "bigots" is, of course, one of this debate's most tedious and intellectually lazy features.

Nobody who has met Stephen Metcalfe would accept that he is "vile", much less a "bigot". There is a perfectly legitimate argument that says, quite simply, that the political class have no right to redefine marriage to include same-sex unions. Marriage is a traditional institution and has been the cornerstone of society for generations and I for one am not sure that it rests within the competency of this present Government to redefine its meaning for us all.

Many of us, who were perfectly comfortable supporting Civil Partnerships precisely because we AREN’T slavering homophones, nevertheless cannot support ‘gay marriage’ (and, frankly, all the pontificating, self-righteous hectoring from its proponents are doing little to sway me to their side). For a start, this has nothing to do with ‘equality’ and everything to do with hijacking language. A few people in the militant gay lobby (I say a few because, let’s not forget, a number of high-profile gay men are opposing gay marriage too – including journalist Andrew Pierce, Labour MP Ben Bradshaw and Tory MP Conor Burns – are they ‘bigots’ too?) are simply not satisfied with Civil Partnerships. They want the State to call it ‘marriage’.

Personally, I’ve reached the conclusion the State should get out of the ‘marriage’ business altogether. Leave marriage to the churches, mosques and synagogues and everyone register a ‘civil union’ separately. Then people can call their union whatever they want without dragging the State into it.

Excellent post Andrew, totally agree.