no, they’re not denied the option of the marriage loophole at all. They are perfectly free to enter into a heterosexual marriage. 
The tricky part is finding two people of the opposite gender who are willing to have their spouses living and sleeping together.
Except you made that argument prior to begbert2’s post, and the distinction between heterosexual unmarried couples and gays may end up being a pivotal point in further debate with you (even though I personally think that many if not all government incentives associated with legal marriage should be opened up to other similar civil contracts), so I’d appreciate an answer in the context of tumbledown’s post instead of begbert2’s.
I was referring to the post I quoted:
There are various definitions to the word ‘tantamount’, and I believe tumbedown’s usage is more a synonym of ‘effectively equivalent’ as opposed to ‘precisely equivalent’.
You would support recovering any financial benefits of marriage received from the estates of any heterosexual married couples who do not have children then, I assume?
This is what he/she says:
My response:
you ask
and now my reply:
the existence or non existence of costs/benefits associated with the “marriage for the sake of the COBRA marriage subsidy” does not change the analysis of whether the entire regime itself is a tax on homosexual couples. it is not. I said this much in my original response.
the existence or non existence of costs/benefits associated with the “marriage for the sake of the COBRA marriage subsidy” is similarly a stupid point to bring up for additional reasons (namely being that marriage isn’t a light-switch kind of thing), which further damages the “well heteros who aren’t married can get married, so they can benefit argument”. but it doesn’t change the fact that it’s still not a tax.
if it would make you feel better: it wouldn’t change the fact that it’s not “tantamount to” a tax if marriage was, actually, light-switch easy to enter into and exit out of. **it’s just a fucking poor analogy and argument to claim that the absence of a benefit is a tax upon those not receiving the benefit. ** (here, i highlighted the take-home point)
can you find me a real dictionary source that doesn’t have the word “equivalent” in it? not “effectively equivalent” but “equivalent”
it’s not my fault that poster is misusing the word because he/she doesn’t actually know what it means.
Stereotypes? What was I stereotyping. I really do have a wife and two daughters. They really did use a lot of diapers. They really do want a lot of stuff. They really are expensive.
Maybe you consider my life a bourgeois stereotype, but it’s still my life.
You are right that I am mostly going for humor, but you are also right that there’s a little bit of teeth to what I wrote.
Make no mistake. I am on your side. I think DOMA is wrong. I can think of no justifiable reason, economic, political, moral, or any other category why a gay couple should not be permitted to enjoy the privileges and protections of a heterosexual couple in terms of marriage.
There are lots of really good reasons why not extending the same rights and privileges is a really really bad idea, besides the obvious one that it’s just not fair.
So we are on the same side, and have consistently been so. This bullshit about it not being a real cost simply because you are not being extended the same subsidy as a married couple is pure bullshit, and anybody that spouts it is an idiot.
I am proud to work for a company where domestic partnerships receive the exact same treatments and benefits as those of married couples. I think any company that fails to do so, should be punished under law for discrimination.
I think gay marriage, and gays in the military are rights that gay people have that should be enforced at the federal level and I think it’s a shame of our country that they are not.
So we are on the same side, ok.
That being said, the “teeth” to my humor is simply… if I may say it bluntly… is to stop whining.
This line for example, is self-demeaning
"when I walked away feeling like you really don’t realize or appreciate the accumulative effect of the injustice. "
What “accumulative effect.” Are you saying that the injustice of DOMA doesn’t stand by itself? That it’s really only serious enough when taken in combination with… something else?
I think when you whine like this (I’m not trying to be insulting, I don’t know what else to call it) you don’t strengthen your case. You weaken it.
It makes you feel bad. So fucking what? I have problems of my own. Who cares ? (that’s what your average nongay gay is going to think.)
My point is that being heterosexual is expensive too. I don’t have diaper bills, and wife bills, and school bills and all this other crap I wrote about because I’m heterosexual, any more than being gay is actually costing you $340 a month.
It’s not being gay that’s costing you $340. It’s being persecuted and discriminated against that is costing you $340. It’s unfair government regulations that are costing you $340. It’s politics and pandering that are costing you $340.
It shouldn’t be about your gayness. Why should I care about that any more than you should care about my daughter’s Polly Pocket addiction? Why is that any of my business or concern?
Your rights to equality and freedom from discrimination or penalty are something I should care about because those are my rights too!
Have I clarified. I am sorry you took it wrong. I’m also sorry that I wrote it in such a way that was not clear. I see that some others have used it to support some shitty stances, and the lack of clarity is my fault.
My criticism (and poor attempt at humor) is that this is not about being gay or heterosexual, or the cumulative effect it has on your feelings, it’s about our rights as human beings to equal treatment which are being violated, and a government that is weak enough to pander to people stupid enough to believe that somehow this unequal treatment doesn’t weaken their rights and freedoms simply because it’s not targeted directly at them.
We cool?
Here is the definition from www.merriam-webster.com:
Main Entry: tan·ta·mount
Pronunciation: \ˈtan-tə-ˌmau̇nt
Function: adjective
Etymology: obsolete tantamount, noun, equivalent, from Anglo-French tant amunter to amount to as much
Date: 1641
: equivalent in value, significance, or effect <a relationship tantamount to marriage>
We’ll start by noting that the damning word “equivalent” is present, starting the definition, but it goes on to say “in value, significance, or effect”. Note the or. I bolded it, see. So note it. That means that if something is equivalent in value but not significance or effect, then it’s still tecnically tantamount, pedantically speaking. Or it can be differently valued if it’s either of equivalent significance, or of equivalent effect.
Note the last - if something has only equivalent effect, that is sufficient to rate as being tantamount. The phrase under dispute is “effectively equivalent”. Think about it for a minute.
We now return you to your regularly scheduled pitting.
I guess you missed the one I slipped into my post:
now explain how this is **equivalent in effect **to a tax.
(like, holy shit, dropping a c-note on the pavement is tantamount to a tax!?!? wow. I guess I can write that off as a deduction then for “other taxes paid”)
It’s equivalent in the effect that you have less money. And for a bonus, in the case of the COBRA thing, you can point the fickle finger of blame at the government for it.
Seriously - learn which battles are worth fighting.
and do both paths subject you to criminal and civil sanction if you (don’t) wind up with X less dollars at the end of a year?
seriously, learn that there’s a big difference between what is a tax and what is a benefit that you can’t receive. even rhetorically.
How in the world can someone be cured of the homosexuality if they aren’t even allowed to get health insurance to pay for the cure?
I’m only replying in the hopes that you’ll entertain me by digging your hole even deeper.
Oh, and, “It’s a tax if I say it’s a tax, dammit. If the poor can pay negative taxes then anything goes.” There, that should get you rolling.
what hole? the one in your head, maybe.
non-receipt of a benefit is not tantamount to a tax. it’s as plain as can be.
Hehehehehehehe :D:D
when you’ve run out of substantive things to say…
Stereotype: “Wives are not cheap. I’ll bet they are [more] expensive than domestic partners.”
I know many women married to women who would disagree with you, who have gone through just as great of efforts to impregnate their partners, nurture them through their pregnancies and deliveries, and raise their children.
There were a few more in there too, but I understand that you were joking and I’m hoping, sincerely, and giving you the benefit of the doubt that you don’t consider yourself or anyone else who has children as inherently superior to those who do not have children, despite the tone of some of your joking.
Also, I was not referring to the accumulative effect on me, but to the accumulative effect on everyone* else not nestled in the soft bussom of DOMA who is specifically denied something because of DOMA. (* because there may be some aspect of DOMA that I agree with, somewhere)
What you consider whining I consider speaking out. This is what is happening to me, and I know that it is happening to others, and many of those people are not going to complain. But I am going to complain. I am going to speak up for why it is wrong, because not everyone thinks about this issue like you do. I would also wager that perhaps you came to hold the views you do because you were exposed to information that led you to your conclusions because…wait for it…somebody complained.
Look who’s talking.
you’re the one who first stopped arguing once you realized that these things are not “tantamount” to each other, even though they share similar (but not equivalent) effects:
physically losing money as tantamount to being taxed.
(a new one for you) committing suicide as tantamount to being murdered.
(or, perhaps, a more relevant one) non-receipt of Montgomery G.I. benefits as tantamount to a tax on those who don’t want to put their lives in danger
(or, another) non-receipt of a child tax credit as tantamount to a tax on those who don’t have kids.
Assuming that was meant to end with a question mark… no, not really. Kind of the opposite, actually, because before I thought you were just making a kind of lame joke, but now it appears there was some larger philosophical point you were trying to make, and try as I might, I just can’t make heads or tails of it.