Today’s entry was suppose to be a restaurant review for Pizzeria Venti, but before I got down to business, I visited RSG’s blog (Her blog is on my bogroll; check it out!) only to read about Oregon putting a halt to their Domestic Partnership registration that was to begin January 1, 2008. I don’t know the details of the Oregon DP law or why it has been halted. I live in Washington State which lags behind Oregon on many social issues. While I root for the LGBT community in Oregon, I am jealous of the strides they have made. Our dream is to someday move to Western Oregon and continue farming and creating things for a population that appreciates “green” living and organic “slow food.” We secretly hope that the gays in Oregon will have things ready for us when we get there. Things like equal rights, lack of discrimination and of course marriage (or Domestic Partnership if that’s the only alternative). It’s sad to see how much time, work, and emotional diress has gone into a fight that only gets halted at the last minute. 3 steps forward, 2 steps back. It’s very frustrating even for me as a spectator.
I searched Google for the list of 1049 rights afforded straight married couples. Wikipedia lists some of those rights and benefits. I thought I’d share them with you.
- Social Security pension
- veteran’s pensions, indemnity compensation for service-connected deaths, medical care, and nursing home care, right to burial in veterans‘ cemeteries, educational assistance, and housing
- survivor benefits for federal employees
- survivor benefits for spouses of longshoremen, harbor workers, railroad workers
- additional benefits to spouses of coal miners who die of black lung disease
- $100,000 to spouse of any public safety officer killed in the line of duty
- continuation of employer-sponsored health benefits
- renewal and termination rights to spouse’s copyrights on death of spouse
- continued water rights of spouse in some circumstances
- payment of wages and workers compensation benefits after worker death
- making, revoking, and objecting to post-mortem anatomical gifts
- employment assistance and transitional services for spouses of members being separated from military service; continued commissary privileges
- per diem payment to spouse for federal civil service employees when relocating
- Indian Health Service care for spouses of Native Americans (in some circumstances)
- sponsor husband/wife for immigration benefits
- veteran’s disability
- Supplemental Security Income
- disability payments for federal employees
- medicaid
- property tax exemption for homes of totally disabled veterans
- income tax deductions, credits, rates exemption, and estimates
- joint filing of bankruptcy permitted
- joint parenting rights, such as access to children’s school records
- family visitation rights for the spouse and non-biological children, such as to visit a spouse in a hospital or prison
- next-of-kin status for emergency medical decisions or filing wrongful death claims
- custodial rights to children, shared property, child support, and alimony after divorce
- domestic violence intervention
- access to “family only” services, such as reduced rate memberships to clubs & organizations or residency in certain neighborhoods
Maybe instead of fighting for our rights, we should focus on fighting to remove these rights from legally married couples. If straight couples lost even one of these rights, there would be a uprising. Heterosexuals who oppose gay marriage argue that God and the Bible define marriage as a union between a man and a woman. Why is any government (federal, state or local) involved in religous unions? Seperation of Church and State should cover that one pretty easily.
The LGBT community don’t get these rights (and responsibilities!) based on marriage as a religous union, yet married heterosexuals get them regardless of there religon or lack there of. Maybe atheists should be lumped in with the LGBT community as well. Agnostics too, for that matter. How about those who havn’t attended a Christian church in over, let’s say, 5 years? And the Buddists? They don’t follow Bible teachings. Oh, here’s a good one. You have to speak English to get married in the US, then we can get into the immigration issue, too. Oh and virgins! Doesn’t Christian teachings say there should be no sex before marriage? Can they test for virginity before allowing 2 peole that are madly in love to join in a holy union?
Either heterosexuals lose all the rights we wish to gain, or only English-speaking virgins should be allowed such priveledges as visiting their spouse in the hospital or making medical decisions for there incapacitated spouse instead of waiting for their sometimes-hostile in-laws to make those decisions for them.
Instead of fighting for our rights let’s fight against theirs!
3 responses so far ↓
Recovering Straight Girl // December 30, 2007 at 9:33 pm
Since the passing of Washington’s DP bill last year, you all are now far and ahead of us here in Oregon. Maybe WE’LL move there!
Excellent post and thoughts, and of course right on the money. Thank you.
Recovering Straight Girl » Blog Archive » January 16, 2008 // December 30, 2007 at 9:53 pm
[...] you to my fellow bloggers and the thoughtful posts that you have made on your own blogs. Beecharmer, Jess, [...]
beecharmers // December 30, 2007 at 10:12 pm
The last time I looked into it, Washingtons DP registration gave us like 4 rights. A very very watered down version. But maybe I am wrong. Will look into it again. We didn’t think it was worth the effort to register.
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