In an issue gay people would file under “problems we would like to have,” a straight British couple is going to court for the right to essentially gay-marry each other.

While some jurisdictions recognize gay marriage, and some allow “civil partnerships,” gay marriage is not a right recognized nearly as widely as same-sex marriage. But the opportunity to marry one another, a right denied gay people in many places, is not enough to satisfy the couple, both of whom are 26:

“The titles of husband and wife and all the things that pop into people’s heads when you say you’re getting married don’t appeal to us,” said (Katherine) Doyle, a student. “In our day-to-day life we feel like civil partners — we don’t feel like husband and wife, and we want the government to recognize that.”

An activist who commented on the case cited a larger motivation to have “one law for everybody,” but also implied that the fight to legalize gay marriage is somehow harmful to straight couples, roughly half of whom don’t even see fit to honor the vows they take in the first place:

“Denying heterosexual couples the right to have a civil partnership is heterophobic,” Peter Tatchell said.

As someone who has watched close gay friends genuinely suffer due to lacking the option to marry, this seems to me to be a bit of a slap in the face to the movement to legalize gay marriage. Setting the debate back to whether marriage, a mostly heterosexual institution, should even exist will only serve to delay gay people being granted equal rights as well as bolster arguments from gay marriage opponents that allowing gay people to marry somehow tears at the fabric of the institution of marriage.

Does this fight advance smarter marriage and civil union related policy, or is it a setback for the fight to allow gays to marry?

[via Fark]

Should straight people also be able to get gay married? is a post from: The Inquisitr

In a move that many gay rights advocates feel is at best backpedalling, and at worst outright betrayal, the Department of Justice filed a brief Thursday upholding the controversial Defense of Marriage Act (DOMA).

Discontent began in May, when information regarding the repeal of DOMA was removed from the White House website. The brief filed this week, which has greatly alarmed gay rights advocates, upholds the rights of individual states to legislate same-sex marriage. Most troubling to proponents of same-sex rights is this portion of the brief, which is, according to gay-rights group The Human Rights Campaign, “neither grounded in fact nor law.”

[DOMA amounts to] a cautious policy of federal neutrality towards a new form of marriage. DOMA maintains federal policies that have long sought to promote the traditional and uniformly-recognized form of marriage, recognizes the right of each State to expand the traditional definition if it so chooses, but declines to obligate federal taxpayers in other States to subsidize a form of marriage that their own states do not recognize.

Human Rights Campaign President Joe Solmonese, in a statement, condemned the decision to determine the rights of millions of Americans based on fiscal policy.

“Same-sex couples and their families are not seeking subsidies. We pay taxes equally, contribute to our communities equally, support each other equally, pay equally into Social Security, and participate equally in our democracy.  Equal protection is not a handout.  It is our right as citizens.”

As long as the Defense of Marriage Act stands, legal same-sex unions will not be recognized in states that allow only for “opposite marriage.”

Obama administration draws ire by upholding the Defense of Marriage act is a post from: The Inquisitr

Congrats to Ellen Degeneres and Portia de Rossi, who were married Saturday afternoon after announcing their engagement just three months ago! Their rep confirmed to PEOPLE that “[They] were married tonight in an intimate ceremony at their home in Los Angeles” in an exclusive report.

It sounds like the whole thing was pretty romantic, too: De Rossi’s mom flew in from Australia for the ceremony and the two even swapped handwritten vows. Oh, and did I mention that they were even outfitted in the same designer? Both girls wore Zac Posen, with Portia in a light pink gown and Ellen in an all-white suit.

Everybody loves a happy couple.

Image: WireImage

Ellen and Portia: Married! is a post from: The Inquisitr