Why does state recognition of marriage matter so much to people? Sure, there are some benefits, the most important of which in my mind is joint custody of children (which is also a good justification of state involvement in marriage), but it appears to matter a lot more than the state involvement justifies.
Why do gays wait for state recognition? Why don’t they just hold a wedding and call themselves married, without state recognition or even a private contract? The only time I’ve ever heard of this is Colin Turnbull.
Supposedly, when the Renhe government policies produced incentives to be legally single, almost all of the married couples got fake divorces, planning on remarrying, but most them turned into real divorces. Searching for that story, I found a lot of similar stories across China in the past couple of years (Renhe was 2006). Actually, most of them involved not getting formally divorced, but acquiring a forged divorce certificate. That’s probably safer for the marriage.
I can think of two big indirect benefits here. The first is perceived social legitimacy, which I don’t think I need to elaborate much on: government recognition of a form of marriage implies formalized social approval of that type of relationship; “husband” and “wife” carry powerful private associations beyond “long-term girlfriend/boyfriend”; and in most modern societies the state’s entangled enough with the institution of marriage that I’d expect a purely private claim to marriage status to feel like a cheat to many people.
The second seems more interesting. One of the reasons that “wife/husband” legitimizes a relationship and carries implications of stability, status, etc. is that it’s potentially expensive: not so much in the sense of initial cost (which is usually substantial, but also almost entirely private), as of dissolution cost. If you get married, at least one party to the marriage is signing up for an institution that they can reasonably expect to extract a lot of money if the relationship is ever dissolved: legal fees, alimony, et cetera. (Child support used to fall into this category too; not so much anymore, but the previous state of affairs probably still contributes to the social position of marriage.)
The existence of these costs provides a very powerful and almost universally recognized signal of commitment, and of all the personal qualities that go with it. And many societies use that to informally gate positions: I’ve heard, for example, that it’s hard to achieve higher officer ranks in the US military if you’re not married, and similar conditions apply to at least some of the corporate hierarchies I’ve been exposed to. But most of these costs vanish if the union isn’t legally recognized, and I’d expect a good chunk of the signaling value they carry to vanish with them.
and in most modern societies the state’s entangled enough with the institution of marriage that I’d expect a purely private claim to marriage status to feel like a cheat to many people.
Why is this? In Slovenia I see non-government institutions doing such marriages all the time and being taken seriously by others. The institutions in question being Churches, since religious marriages are not legally recognized here. Some people only do the “Church wedding”, most also do the “State wedding”.
I don’t see a strong reason why other non-government institutions couldn’t carry the same kind of social legitimacy.
There are other issues—marriage carries a bunch of legal implications which are frequently to the advantage of the married couple. Offhand, there’s hospital visitation, default inheritance, and immigration rights.
Right. Douglas_Knight seemed already to be taking direct benefits like these into account, so I was looking for indirect ones: situations where words like “spouse” never appear in a statement of policy, but social benefits from being married accrue anyway for less obvious reasons.
The first is perceived social legitimacy, which I don’t think I need to elaborate much on: government recognition of a form of marriage implies formalized social approval of that type of relationship; “husband” and “wife” carry powerful private associations beyond “long-term girlfriend/boyfriend”; and in most modern societies the state’s entangled enough with the institution of marriage that I’d expect a purely private claim to marriage status to feel like a cheat to many people.
Said social legitimacy is itself frequently also legally enforced, e.g., there having been cases of Catholic adoption agencies being shut down because they refuse to let gay couples adopt.
Why does state recognition of marriage matter so much to people?
Sure, there are some benefits, the most important of which in my mind is joint custody of children (which is also a good justification of state involvement in marriage), but it appears to matter a lot more than the state involvement justifies.
Why do gays wait for state recognition? Why don’t they just hold a wedding and call themselves married, without state recognition or even a private contract? The only time I’ve ever heard of this is Colin Turnbull.
Supposedly, when the Renhe government policies produced incentives to be legally single, almost all of the married couples got fake divorces, planning on remarrying, but most them turned into real divorces. Searching for that story, I found a lot of similar stories across China in the past couple of years (Renhe was 2006). Actually, most of them involved not getting formally divorced, but acquiring a forged divorce certificate. That’s probably safer for the marriage.
I can think of two big indirect benefits here. The first is perceived social legitimacy, which I don’t think I need to elaborate much on: government recognition of a form of marriage implies formalized social approval of that type of relationship; “husband” and “wife” carry powerful private associations beyond “long-term girlfriend/boyfriend”; and in most modern societies the state’s entangled enough with the institution of marriage that I’d expect a purely private claim to marriage status to feel like a cheat to many people.
The second seems more interesting. One of the reasons that “wife/husband” legitimizes a relationship and carries implications of stability, status, etc. is that it’s potentially expensive: not so much in the sense of initial cost (which is usually substantial, but also almost entirely private), as of dissolution cost. If you get married, at least one party to the marriage is signing up for an institution that they can reasonably expect to extract a lot of money if the relationship is ever dissolved: legal fees, alimony, et cetera. (Child support used to fall into this category too; not so much anymore, but the previous state of affairs probably still contributes to the social position of marriage.)
The existence of these costs provides a very powerful and almost universally recognized signal of commitment, and of all the personal qualities that go with it. And many societies use that to informally gate positions: I’ve heard, for example, that it’s hard to achieve higher officer ranks in the US military if you’re not married, and similar conditions apply to at least some of the corporate hierarchies I’ve been exposed to. But most of these costs vanish if the union isn’t legally recognized, and I’d expect a good chunk of the signaling value they carry to vanish with them.
Why is this? In Slovenia I see non-government institutions doing such marriages all the time and being taken seriously by others. The institutions in question being Churches, since religious marriages are not legally recognized here. Some people only do the “Church wedding”, most also do the “State wedding”.
I don’t see a strong reason why other non-government institutions couldn’t carry the same kind of social legitimacy.
There are other issues—marriage carries a bunch of legal implications which are frequently to the advantage of the married couple. Offhand, there’s hospital visitation, default inheritance, and immigration rights.
Right. Douglas_Knight seemed already to be taking direct benefits like these into account, so I was looking for indirect ones: situations where words like “spouse” never appear in a statement of policy, but social benefits from being married accrue anyway for less obvious reasons.
Said social legitimacy is itself frequently also legally enforced, e.g., there having been cases of Catholic adoption agencies being shut down because they refuse to let gay couples adopt.