I tried, but I could only take so much, and then I scrolled to the bottom.

Ake - Shut up, would you? I have friends here who's views differ widely from mine yet, on a personal level I value them greatly. I've not hung around the 'cat a lot in recent years, but, in internet terms, I think we we had a relationship once, right? For the rest of you going "hurhur", that means he called me names cos he's Scottish & I'm a dirty Sassenach, and I called him names because I'm English & he's just an ignorant Sweaty Sock... ;-)

Ake is not an ignorant hate-filled bigot. But Ake, you are sounding like a right bleeding idiot here. Yes, I've got the idea that you don't like the idea of gay marriage. I think we've all got that idea by now. If you're repeating it for the 14th time (and you are), you're wasting everyone's time. Especially your own.

What two (or more) people get up to in private is no-one's business but their own. So long as it's consensual. Quibbling about pointless distinctions in wording is, well, pointless. What does it matter whether it's called civil union or marriage? I don't doubt that it is possible to arrange a "marriage" ('twixt whoever) in a solictor's office & to be sueing for divorce before the ink is dry on the certificate! So what price marriage? Really?

My neighbour is in jail on a gun charge. Not because he's gay, but because his evil cow of a wife stitched him up. I've a couple of very good friends, male, who have been together for more than a decade. I don't know if they want to get married, but if they do, why shouldn't they? How would their marriage be less valid than the godawful fuck-up that Graham has patiently suffered (yes, Ake, there is a daughter involved. Gods help the poor little lass)? I cannot conceive (pun)!

Then there's Muppet. Whilst I largely agree with his views in this thread, he has yet again shown himself to be an intolerant, arrogant troll. You can agree with Muppet. Or you can be wrong. He may be a doctor (of course, we've only Ian Mather's word for that), but he's just as capable of being a narrow-minded ignoramus as anyone else!

As for Guest from Sanity, I will take it on trust that every single one of the rest of us is incurably insane. Because if he is sane, I think that's not a place any of us want to be!