Marriage should not be a legal concept

Rebuttals 1. Marriage gives everyone equal individual rights because everyone has the same ability to get married. Firstly, my claims about individual rights were not concerning this issue, but rather about an individual's right to decide what is a marriage to them, without government deciding on behalf of all society. However, concerning the matter of fairness, equality of group rights is just as important as individual rights. People should be able to form groups that have same rights as all other groups regardless of their constituents. A group of two gay men should have the same rights as one gay man and one straight woman. Offering a group a marriage license contingent on their gender makeup is akin to offering a business the right to incorporate contingent on the balance of their racial makeup. If it is wrong to discriminate against an individual based on gender, it is just as wrong to discriminate against a group based on gender makeup.2. Involvement in marriage is for the benefit of society. As I stated before, government should not sacrifice fairness or individual rights for the greater good of society. It is precisely this principle that prevents us from forming governments according to utilitarian principles that would allow things like sacrificing a medical patient against his will to harvest his organs and save five others.3. A person's desire to be recognized as something does not give them a right to be recognized for it. This sidesteps my argument, the claim was not that people have a right to BE recognized for things, it is that they have the right to decide what THEY recognize. Government is a societal representative, by taking using that role to define marriage on society's behalf, they take this right out of the hands of the citizens. Not only is this unfair to some group no matter which way they decide, it is unreasonable to unify the concept at all. Different organizations, religions, and groups have different ideas about marriage. They should not be forced to agree. 4. Marriage is not a restriction, it merely gives benefits to a subset of peopleIrrelevant, it is not about restriction. It is about fairness: government's resources come from the entirety of the citizenry. If they use them to benefit a subset, then that is taking away from the remainder.5. Rights of marriage can be gotten through other means, aside from tax filing which would allow people to exploit the system. There are countless rights and advantages that come with the title "married" throughout law. It is not at all a simple manner to unify a pair piece by piece as Con claims. Since my point he was referring to was about gaining the convenience, claiming you can do the same thing with far more work is not valid (and convenience in legal matters is NOT a trivial thing, legal fees and the possibility of making mistakes have very real and practical impact). Being able to obtain this unity with a single legal status change is something that would only be fair if any pair can do it. In regards to filing taxes, Con only claims this is "taking advantage" because it is currently outside the law to gain these advantages. As we are debating precisely whether or not that law should change, this is irrelevant.6. The role of government is to look out for society's best interestsAs I have stated repeatedly now, society's best interests come second to fairness and the rights of the individual. The role of the government is first to protect individual rights, second to ensure equality, and lastly to do everything it can to benefit the whole within those confines. Con asserts that UCSIS verifying an intimate relationship is an important first step in determining if a marriage is a scam. As it was my assertion that determining whether or not their personal relation exists is not helpful to determining whether ot not undesirable people are being let into the country, this was a completely irrelevant statement. Con does not address my assertion that spending time finding out whether or not they are in a relationship detracts from time and resources that could be spent determining whether the foreigner is someone who should be a citizen.7. Marriage has value in societyA. KinshipCon again makes an argument regarding the benefits to society, which I still contend is secondary to fairness and individual rights. It is not fair to this brother and sister to be unable to partake of benefits that others can, which comes partially from their tax money and participation in government. B. Monogamy vs PolygamyCon contends that monogamy (and by implication, only monogamy) involves love. And furthermore that a polygamous relationship necessitates servitude. This is wholly inaccurate, there are and have been polygamous relationships involving love (as an aside, I know of one such from amongst my personal acquaintances between a man and two bisexual women who all love each other equally). This in fact exemplifies one of my earlier points: Con is of one group who cannot conceive of the types of relationships another group has being equal to the ones he is familiar with. Government should not have tried to unify their conceptions, but rather should have left them to themselves. Regarding divorce, Con argues that government should not deny a divorce after cheating. This supports my argument: that they should have only a legal union to worry about, that they can form or dissolve at their own will without government's involvement. It is, in fact, only because of the concept of marriage, that government ever does deny such a divorce. C. SeparationCon has misrepresented both of my points, I do not contend that unions should be expanded to discourage separation. He is referring to my statement which pointed out that his own arguments at the time indicated that unions encourage stability, and hence I would argue that that then means it is not beneficial to deny them to anyone. This had nothing to do with separations. I also do not ever claim that marriage has no effect, clearly it has many effects I disagree with and have enumerated throughout this debate. I claimed that it does not have the effect he argued it does: to create stability where there was none. If a couple are not functional, forcing them to stay married will not bring stability to them. Both of these points refer to the fact that people should be in charge of their own unions, and government involving itself, whether it be to forbid two people from forming a union, or to forbid a union from dissolving itself, is rarely helpful. ConclusionA major theme throughout Con's arguments is the benefit to society. He frequently challenges me to show how legal unions benefit society more than marriage. I have stated repeatedly that benefit to society is secondary to fairness and individual rights, making such a challenge irrelevant. Con has made several arguments in regards to individual rights, which I have rebutted. But although this point has been in contention from round two, he has not responded to issue of fairness. Every time the issue of whether it is fair for one couple (and I use this word in the numeric, not the romantic sense) to be granted benefits and rights that another is not, he cites societal benefit, sidestepping the issue that societal benefit is secondary to fairness. Government should not take from one person to benefit another. Government should not unilaterally force people to recognize what they do not wish to recognize. And most importantly of all, government should not try to control any aspect of people's personal relationships.