Think of common law marriage, where if you live together for a period of time, then you're automatically married. Legally married. Nothing to do with religion.

What you're suggesting is that there be a caste system where heterosexual couples can be legally MARRIED but gay couples must be relegated to a generic and meaningless legal status such as “unionized” that is set up to parody marriage.

This invites further discrimination against gay couples. When the Sarah Palin's of the world want to ban gay couples from something, all they have to do is pass a law saying “only MARRIED couples are allowed (fill in the blank).” How convenient.

This has already happened. In Arkansas, they passed a law saying “only MARRIED couple can adopt.” So even if gay couples get civil unions someday in that state, they would still be banned from adopting because they are not legally MARRIED, they are only “unionzed.”

There is no such thing as “seperate but equal.”

Think of common law marriage, where if you live together for a period of time, then you're automatically married. Legally married. Nothing to do with religion.

What you're suggesting is that there be a caste system where heterosexual couples can be legally MARRIED but gay couples must be relegated to a generic and meaningless legal status such as “unionized” that is set up to parody marriage.

This invites further discrimination against gay couples. When the Sarah Palin's of the world want to ban gay couples from something, all they have to do is pass a law saying “only MARRIED couples are allowed (fill in the blank).” How convenient.

This has already happened. In Arkansas, they passed a law saying “only MARRIED couple can adopt.” So even if gay couples get civil unions someday in that state, they would still be banned from adopting because they are not legally MARRIED, they are only “unionzed.”

There is no such thing as “seperate but equal.”