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AIBU?

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Original poster

No same sex civil partnerships

191 replies

Applebite · 21/02/2017 11:52

AIBU to wonder who would take this to Court? Surely the point of civil partnerships was to recognise FINALLY that gay people have the same rights and needs as hetero people?

Or am I missing something that you get in a civil partnership but not a marriage? I mean, I can see why you might not want to get married, and why you would think there should be more rights for "common law spouses", but would a civil partnership give you anything (or less of something) that marriage wouldn't?

www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2017/02/21/heterosexual-couple-learn-outcome-civil-partnership-battle-court/

OP posts:
bookworm14 · 21/02/2017 13:53

I find this baffling. As others have said, civil partnerships were introduced as a fudge to try and avoid same-sex marriage. Now that we have same-sex marriage, CPs are irrelevant.

For those who want a CP because they dislike the connotations of marriage: marriage is what you make of it. Go to the registry office with your partner and a couple of witnesses and you're done. You don't have to wear a white dress, have a party, take your partner's name, call yourself 'wife', or anything else - all of that is just cultural expectations.

PerspicaciaTick · 21/02/2017 13:54

Is the £500 charged because you wanted more guests than the statutory wedding room can hold?

KnitMeAUnicorn · 21/02/2017 13:55

So anything discriminatory to human rights should simply be accepted or overlooked if it involves rich westerners, apple?

BroomstickOfLove · 21/02/2017 13:57

There is an option of witnesses only in the ordinary office for the £50 mentioned, £300ish charge for a room with up to 6 additional guests and £500 for any more than that.

And if you want to get married on a Friday or weekend, you can't use the office.

KnitMeAUnicorn · 21/02/2017 13:58

'It doesn't have to cost a lot to have a wedding.'
'A wedding doesn't need to be religious, just get married in a registry office.'

Moot arguments that miss the whole point. And why the assumption that those who want CPs must want to do it quietly as if we're almost embarrassed about the whole thing, with a handful of guests and on a shoestring? Maybe I'd like 200 guests at my eventual opposite-sex CP at a castle somewhere, y'know?

Original poster
Applebite · 21/02/2017 13:58

Yep, that's what I said, knit.

If you really think that this issue breaches anyone's human rights, you knock yourself out fighting for it. For me personally, I find that stance offensive to the many people who were denied the chance to be married for so many years.

OP posts:
HostaFireAndIce · 21/02/2017 14:00

The rights of marriage and civil partnership are the same. That's the important thing not the terminology.

I may be misinformed, but I was told once that this is not true. I don't know exactly how they differ, but the rights in a CP are not exactly the same as those in marriage. The person who told me this was in a CP.

PeachMelba78 · 21/02/2017 14:00

Broomstick you can 'upgrade' from Civil Partnership to Marriage for free, or you can pay for a ceremony if you would like. Either way you get the marriage backdated but I think this is only for 2 years after the equal marriage bill has been in force for in your country.

Lottapianos · 21/02/2017 14:02

CPs are NOT irrelevant! Tell that to all the people who have one and continue to get them. As well as the people in opposite sex partnerships who would get one like a shot if they could - several examples on this thread alone

This story is not over. All 3 judges have said that the status quo cannot continue and that the law must be changed sooner or later, it's just that 2 out of 3 decided that the government should be given longer to get its act together. There is cross party support for extension of Caps in the House of Commons. So fingers crossed it will happen soon.

KnitMeAUnicorn · 21/02/2017 14:06

I find that stance offensive to the many people who were denied the chance to be married for so many years.

Again, missing the point.

Equality is equality is equality.

MackerelOfFact · 21/02/2017 14:06

If you really think that this issue breaches anyone's human rights, you knock yourself out fighting for it. For me personally, I find that stance offensive to the many people who were denied the chance to be married for so many years.

I totally agree, OP.

It's like white people in 1700s America moaning they aren't able to access slavery as a career option, because paid employment 'doesn't meet their needs.' Boo fucking hoo. Cry me a river.

(Obviously slavery isn't actually comparable to a civil partnership).

ChiefClerkDrumknott · 21/02/2017 14:13

But if the rights are the same, why would you want a CP? Other than to make a point that you don't want a marriage, perhaps?

Yes, exactly

KnitMeAUnicorn · 21/02/2017 14:15

Yes, I don't want a marriage.

Should I want a marriage? Why?

PeachMelba78 · 21/02/2017 14:16

CPs are different in the way you only call your partner legally a Partner. Also you don't get divorced, the union is dissolved. We wanted to 'upgrade' to marriage as that is what we wanted all along - I love being able to legally call my wife, my wife!

I do think however that people should be allowed a CP if they want one - gay or not.

LozzaChops101 · 21/02/2017 14:17

CPs were a legislated "fuck you" to same sex couples, and if they weren't they'd have made them universal to start with. I'm all for Civil Unions of some description, but for straight people to yell discrimination because they don't have access to something that absolutely discriminated against others really rankles, tbh.

I interviewed a gay man in his 70s back when Civil Partnership legislation was passed who said he would never enter into one because he would forever be legally registered as homosexual and he was scared about who could access that information. That might seem paranoid, but not to a man who had been forced to live his life in the closet for 50 years.

We had to live with the fact that we are forced to out ourselves by our "partnered" status because we couldn't describe ourselves as married.

Couple with religious faith who could only access Civil Partnerships to legally formalise their relationships weren't allowed a single reference to faith in their ceremonies. Not music, imagery, text.

And you cannot cite adultery as grounds to dissolve your partnership.

Civil Partnership has always been Less Than, and it feels like gross privilege not to recognise that.

Lottapianos · 21/02/2017 14:19

Yes, I do want to make a point that I don't want a marriage. That's how strongly I feel about it. I would love to be in an equal legal partnership with my partner, without any talk of consummation or husband or wife or til death do us part. A partnership, not a marriage. People who do want marriage can still knock themselves out, it won't affect them one jot

RandomMess · 21/02/2017 14:21

I have friends who absolutely don't want to get married but want the legal protection of CP, they have no faith, don't want to have to say various words in front of people etc. I think CP should be allowed as an option to all couples.

I think people forget that CP does give legal rights and some couples want that without marrying.

DementedUnicorn · 21/02/2017 14:26

The slavery analogy, whilst extreme, pretty much sums up my opinion on this

MuseumOfCurry · 21/02/2017 14:26

This is the reason the state should recognise one and only one partnership - a civil one. Any kind of add-ons should be the remit of religious institutions or similar.

Mummyoflittledragon · 21/02/2017 14:28

I know a couple of women, who both have children and refuse to get married because their mother, who has dementia wouldn't be able to attend. They aren't protecting themselves or their children as well as they could. Perhaps a civil partnership would be a good idea for them. The why's and wherefore's of many laws could be equally challenged as oppressive if we go back a little further. Even something as banal as why the fuck are women's hygiene products not vat exempt when men's razors are for example. I see no issue with extending civil partnerships to all couples. This court case is a waste of time. There have been a few of them recently. Yes, I'm looking at you Theresa May be as disaster for this country.

CharlieAustinsMagicHat · 21/02/2017 14:28

If people want a civil partnership for legal rights all they need to do is to get legal protection drawn up for inheritance, children etc.

DreamingofSummer · 21/02/2017 14:28

The very definition of a first world problem.

Attention seeking of the finest kind,

JAPAB · 21/02/2017 14:29

but would a civil partnership give you anything (or less of something) that marriage wouldn't?

It might give more or less, but only is a subjective sense I suspect. Psychologically some people prefer to be "married", whereas others would prefer not to be because of the negative connotations they have wrt marriage.

I don't think there is any difference outside of personal attitude, however.

mrsp0tts · 21/02/2017 14:29

There should be the option for either marriage or civil partnership for opposite and same sex couples. Whatever the couple prefer.

Civil partnership was created as an easy way out to appease same sex couples but was frankly bullshit because opposite sex couples couldn't do it, therefore wasn't equal.

KnitMeAUnicorn · 21/02/2017 14:31

The slavery analogy is fatuous. A CP is the desirable option to me, not a poor relation of what some see as the 'proper' option of marriage, which many of you seem to think I should want.

What do you care if I have an opposite-sex CP? What difference does it make to you?