[Shasown]

Originally Posted by BB_Eye

They are exempt from the the Equality Act anyway. If gay marriage is made legal, things will carry on as normal in those places.

Nobody's religious lives would be interfered with. They can stick with their dated beliefs of their own accord while other people are free to do what they like.

Even if this weren't the case, I find your view really populist. As if a law can only be enacted if it meets the approval of opinion polls and religious hierarchies. Think of all the laws that were passed in the 1960's extending the rights of ethnic minorities which initially met with overwhelming public opposition. Should they have just waited until the public were "ready for it"?

It has already happened in the Netherlands, Spain, Portugal, Argentina, Canada and South Africa, not before time either. The Church and the the Muslim Council of Britain can chuck their toys out the pram all they like. They're not running this country.

In order to give the right to marriage, the Government would have had to repeal the Marriage Act, then repeal all subsidary laws based on it, thats about 15 at a rough guess for England and Wales and about 5 for Scotland. Thats just dealing with the acts that directly use the marriage act as a base. Without the few hundred that refer to to it dealing with all kinds of subjects, each in turn would need amending.

All the government had to do was replace it with a new all encompassing act and get that act and the repeals through both houses. Remembering the house of lords also has the Lords Bishops sitting for all that, every part of the new act would have been questioned, debated and amendments made in both houses causing further delays.

Governments nowadays are populist thats the problem and you may think you can just ignore any fuss kicked up by the Church of England and the Muslim Council for Britain, dont kid yourself they have enormous lobbying power. Thats without the backup of all the other churches and religions sticking in their two penneth.

The Church of England is part of the Establishment it still has considerable power. Regardless of how liberal you think this country is, there is still a homophobic undercurrent to it.

As for the argument that it wont affect religions, of course it will. First in the minds of the leaders of those religions, its another step towards them being forced to do something against the current tenets of that religion.

But if you make exemptions to a law those exemptions can be challenged up to and including in Europe. This happened with the Forces exemptions for sexual discrimination ref women being pregnant etc, then under the equality acts with homosexuals challenging the policy of not allowing them to serve.

Its okay quoting other countries that have allowed same sex marriages, there are a few more, Sweden Iceland Norway, even some US states allow it, but peoples and cultures are totally different. Just remember it may look good for Portugal to allow same sex marriages but they dont allow same sex couples to adopt.

Now you have a compromise whereby same sex couple have almost the same rights as straight couples, but it is what the government at the time knew they would be able to bring into statute. Its by no means ideal but its the best that will be allowed for a good few years yet.