To be or not to be....

I think its an important discussion, but I am afraid we won't have it.

The question is this:  "Why do we have a public policy that rewards married people?"

We offer tax advantages, legal positions, assumed joint ownership, and other advantages.  Why?

The law does not enshrine the marriage covenant, certainly.  There was a time when married people enjoyed protections as though they were "one", but no more.  A spouse cannot automatically receive information on spousal medical conditions.  I helped a friend work through settling her husbands estate, they were happily married, but where he had assumed she'd automatically have access she didn't, causing her grief to be aggravated by unreasonable bureaucratic efforts to save his estate from her claims,

Much of this is caused by the leaning away from the law encouraging marriage by making marriage easy to dissolve.  What 50 years ago was complex and difficult is now routine, divorce "just because" is an assumed right in most cases.

Children out of wedlock are almost a norm, and, in fact, are not even a reason to be married.  In fact, there is a level of public support that PENALIZES the marriage as welfare benefits are more for single women than married women regardless of employment status.  Nobody cares who has children with whom.  Nobody cares if the children can be supported, because the government will if the parents won't.  The government views the children as though they belong to the government, not the parents, the parents can raise the children as long as the government lets them.

There was a time when our public policy correctly encouraged marriage to be a desirable foundation for the population.  The archaic idea that a family with a mother and father devoted to each other in a covenant relationship was considered healthy, and assumed that 2 adults would share household roles that might create some income disadvantage and deserved some help because society benefited from this core family unit.

Not true anymore.  The law encourages both spouses to work, provides someone else to raise the children (increasingly more), and now does not identify marriage as an institution to encourage procreation.  There is scant recognition of joint rights as the government does not allow that spouses have joined their individuality in their spousal relationship, and, instead, the government insists that spouses are individuals regardless of their marriage vows and pledges.

The stupid argument over "marriage rights" should be the final blow to the institution of civil marriage.  Governments at all levels would get out of the marriage business, and not recognize marriage as anything, dissolving any automatic tax conditions, ownership rights, or name changes.  All of these can be obtained if individuals wish to make legal contracts.

If the government got out of the marriage discussion, people could marry under the circumstances they wish, and I wouldn't be forced to agree, discuss, or debate the validity of any marriage.  My marriage is one that is a covenant first and foremost to my wife before God, and is valid whether or not I have a tax benefit or civil recognition.  That's the way it should be, marriage is between people, not people and the government.  Why does the government have any input?