The problem with suffering under a state for the entirety of your life is that you become conditioned to seeing everything as a political solution. Take the issue of same-sex marriage. Same-sex marriage has been a political hot button issue in recent years. One side, the sane one, wants same-sex couples to enjoy the same privileges and heterosexual couples while the other side, the insane one that believes legislating morality is good policy, oppose the idea. The first side wants to legalize same-sex marriage whereas the other side wants to keep it illegal. Too few, due to conditioning instilled by a life under statism, ask the import question, why is the state involved in marriage at all?
Marriage, after all, is nothing more than voluntary association. Two or more people, sometimes under religious rules and sometimes not, decide they want to enter an agreement that typically involves sharing property and power of attorney. It seems that Alabama is the first state where this question was genuinely considered and it resulted in the abolition of marriage licenses:
Why are there marriage “licenses” – a permission slip granted or denied by the state – rather than just contracts like any other? Why does government stand in the position to veto the choices of two people who want to commit to each other?
These are questions that the Alabama Senate considered in May this year. The result was the passage of Senate Bill 377, supported by 22 senators and opposed by only 3. Under this legislation, licenses would no longer exist for marriage. Marriage would become a plain contract filed with the Probate offices.
In effect, this would restore the traditional role of law in marriage as it has existed in most times and places, before the racially motivated and eugenically inspired idea of “marriage licenses” came along in the early part of the 20th century.
Being a political solution I wouldn’t be surprised if something was inserted to fuck certain classes of people over (say polygamous groups) but it’s certainly a more sane solution than deciding whether certain forms of marriage should be legal or illegal.
Religious aspects of marriage, when applicable, should remain exclusively in the hands of the religious. The contractual aspects of marriage should remain in the hands of the individuals entering the arrangement and their representatives (and, if things fall apart, their chosen party to resolve the dispute). The idea that the state, which is the most immoral institution in the world, should be allowed to grant or refuse permission is ludicrous. How, exactly, is an organization build on theft, kidnapping, assault, and murder a good moral judge for deciding whether or not individuals can voluntarily enter a contractual arrangement? I’m glad everybody isn’t trapped in the legalize or prohibit mentality.