Sentiment. Which, if I may say, is the reason there’s a wedding in the first place.
What part of “All the EMOTIONAL and social importance” was difficult to grasp? Doesn’t that include sentiment?
Again, it seems to be if you’re an American holding a marriage ceremony and inviting your family and friends because you want them there, it makes damned little sense to run across the border to Canada and make them drive up with you to hold it when you could hold the same ceremony at home in the States. Legally, a Canadian gay marriage isn’t legal in the States. So unless you move to Canada permanently, there’s no point in bothering to get it done in Canada. What benefit would it possibly give you if you aren’t living in Canada? I mean, isn’t that what the OP was asking?
But, hey, if they want to come here PERMANENTLY, I say go for it. There’s lots of room.
Love? The support of your family and friends? Your commitment to your community, and your community to you, that you will cherish your bonds and are to be held accountable to your vows?
Sure. Same for heterosexuals.
It’s not the same ceremony to me if the state’s relationship to it is different, even if it’s not my state. We have already had a ceremony with an officiant and our families and friends. We would invite our families and friends if we went to Canada, but would have a discussion with them about what it meant to us and why we were inviting them to another event. My mother would be thrilled if my marriage were recognized by any state.
I don’t live in Vermont, but as I noted above, a Vermont civil union caused my reluctant local newspaper to include a deceased woman’s female partner in the obituary. Legitimacy in one venue sometimes increases rights and privileges in another.
But refusing to include a same-sex partner in the obit would make the newspaper liable for discrimination on the basis of sexual orientation under human rights law. Oh, wait, this is the U.S. …
That’s what I mean, RickJay. It can be of sentimental value to hold a legal ceremony, even if it isn’t legal once you get home.
quote:
In determining the meaning of any Act of Congress, or of any ruling, regulation, or interpretation of the various administrative bureaus and agencies of the United States, the word ‘marriage’ means only a legal union between one man and one woman as husband and wife, and the word ‘spouse’ refers only to a person of the opposite sex who is a husband or a wife.
And all of that is pretty damn similar to what Canadian Parliament set into law in the past two decades-- and was found unconstitutional by courts in Ontario, Quebec and BC.
You folks are aware that common law courts between the two nations do occasionally look at each other for precedence, right? So what you’ve got is U.S. gays marrying in Canada, and they will sue their home state and country to get legal recognition.
If I weren’t an ugly and unlovable person, and there were someone I wanted to “marry,” even though it wasn’t legal here in America, I’d go to Canada. Because it would mean that much more to know that I’m legally married somewhere, even if this worthless, backwards, bastard country refuses to acknowledge reality.
Being in the Pacific northwest, it would probably be closer to just go to Canada, huh?
I do live in Vermont, and my girl and I had a civil union in 2000. I was gonna encourage you to come up here and have that done.
No residency requirement, you pick up the civil union license from the town clerk in the town you want it done. There are even a couple of bed & breakfasts and country inns that offer civil union packages, I belive.
** Gravity, ** I once had a cat with your name! We have been to Vermont and had a very nice civil union in Brattleboro, staying at a lesbian B&B in Massachusetts afterward–Tin Roof Inn, perhaps? Everyone at the town clerk’s office was happy and helpful.