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Speaker 1: Brought to you by the reinvented two thousand twelve Camray.

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Speaker 1: It's ready. Are you welcome to Stop mom? Never told you?

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Speaker 1: From house Stop works dot Com. Hey, and welcome to podcast.

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Speaker 1: This is Molly and I'm Kristen. Kristen. We are in

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Speaker 1: the first week of November. This time we're recording this podcast.

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Speaker 1: We had big elections this week. It was an off

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Speaker 1: your election, but still lots of things that garnered headlines,

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Speaker 1: including a vote in Maine. Yeah. Kind of well, depressing

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Speaker 1: vote in Maine. It depends on your point of view.

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Speaker 1: That's what we're gonna get into. Voters decided to repeal

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Speaker 1: Maine's new law allowing gay men and lesbians to wed

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Speaker 1: and it was kind of a shock. People thought, you know, Maine,

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Speaker 1: pretty liberal state, very libertarian. Uh, they're gonna be okay

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Speaker 1: with with staying out of this debate. Yeah, because New

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Speaker 1: England has been the hub so far of the gay

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Speaker 1: marriage movement. Um So, like you said, they thought that

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Speaker 1: Maine would be pretty solid, especially when you consider or

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Speaker 1: that someplace like Iowa, which we would think Midwest a

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Speaker 1: little more conservative just past um uh same sex marriage

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Speaker 1: law as well. This year, But there was no no

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Speaker 1: referendum on that, so christ And obviously this is a

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Speaker 1: contentious issue. We can't make any sort of case about

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Speaker 1: whether what's right what's wrong, And we definitely want to

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Speaker 1: stay out of religious reasons for why people may support

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Speaker 1: or not support this type of marriage. But we wanted

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Speaker 1: to talk today about the difference between a civil union

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Speaker 1: and marriage. Yeah, and this I was curious about this.

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Speaker 1: I've been curious about this for a while because, for instance,

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Speaker 1: you hear a lot of politicians, including Obama, say things

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Speaker 1: on the campaign trail like, you know, I'm all for

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Speaker 1: civil unions. I think that's great, but I think that

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Speaker 1: marriage is between a man and a woman, and so

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Speaker 1: it kind of makes it sound like it's just an

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Speaker 1: argument in semantics, like who cares whether or not marriages

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Speaker 1: applies to a man and a woman or a man

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Speaker 1: and a man or two women. Doesn't really matter. So

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Speaker 1: I wanted to know legally, what is is the background

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Speaker 1: of all of this, So, like you said, we're not

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Speaker 1: We're gonna stay out of politics and religion as much

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Speaker 1: as we can and really focus on the legal background

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Speaker 1: to marriages, civil unions, and a little bit of domestic

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Speaker 1: partnership thrown in as well. Yeah, we don't want to

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Speaker 1: offend anyone religiously today. We just want to offend lawyers

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Speaker 1: with our with our interpretation of the law and the Constitution.

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Speaker 1: So let's start off just with the stuff we found

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Speaker 1: about definitions of civil unions versus marriage. Yeah, and a

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Speaker 1: lot of this starts in with the passage of the

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Speaker 1: Defense of Marriage Act, and that was signed it a loss,

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Speaker 1: surprisingly by the very liberal um Bill Clinton, and it

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Speaker 1: basically stipulated that for all federal legal purposes, marriage is

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Speaker 1: a union between one man and one woman defined as spouse.

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Speaker 1: And not only that, but it's stipulated that states cannot

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Speaker 1: um basically enforce their same sex marriage laws onto other states.

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Speaker 1: So for instance, if I go to Iowa and I

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Speaker 1: get married, if I come back here to Georgia, Georgia

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Speaker 1: does not have to recognize my same sex marriage right.

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Speaker 1: And because it's on the federal level, you also don't

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Speaker 1: get the right to federal benefits that married couples do. Yeah,

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Speaker 1: there are This is according to fact checked up dot org.

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Speaker 1: There are three main provisions UM that differentiate marriage and

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Speaker 1: civil unions, and the first one is taxes UM. Because

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Speaker 1: couples in a civil union can file a joint state

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Speaker 1: tax return, but they must file federal tax returns as

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Speaker 1: single people. Right, And that's just one of the one thousand,

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Speaker 1: one thirty eight federal laws affect married couples that wouldn't

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Speaker 1: affect someone who got married in Iowa, let's say. And then, UM,

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Speaker 1: you also have issues with health insurance UM. According to

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Speaker 1: uh GLAD organization, it comes down to what's governed by

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Speaker 1: state law and what's subject to federal oversight. So it

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Speaker 1: gets a little complicated, but basically, if a private employer's

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Speaker 1: health plans are subject to let's say Massachusetts state insurance laws,

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Speaker 1: then the benefits have to be extended to the same

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Speaker 1: sex spouse or if the health plan is governed by

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Speaker 1: the federal law, on the other hand, the employer can

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Speaker 1: choose whether or not to extend such benefits. So you're

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Speaker 1: gonna see this theme a lot state versus federal law.

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Speaker 1: And the last big one is social Security survivor benefits.

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Speaker 1: You know, if you're a married couple, then you have

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Speaker 1: the right to the social security based on earnings that

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Speaker 1: the married couple rather than just the person who's still

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Speaker 1: livings earnings, and so you're not eligible for that UM

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Speaker 1: if you have the same sex marriage in a state

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Speaker 1: that allows it. Yeah, And um, like you said, this

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Speaker 1: is these are just broad categories because there are over

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Speaker 1: a thousand different federal laws in the books that have

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Speaker 1: um provisions specifically for married people, which under the Defense

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Speaker 1: Marriage Act, applies only to a man and a woman

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Speaker 1: who are spouses. Now, Christen said, there are three things

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Speaker 1: that differentiate civil unions and marriage, And those first two

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Speaker 1: they're prey concrete. The third one is a little bit

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Speaker 1: more nebulous because it all comes down to the terminology

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Speaker 1: of marriage. And I think that this will be the

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Speaker 1: aspect we spend the least amount of time, because this

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Speaker 1: is when you get into maybe a religious viewpoint on

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Speaker 1: what is the marriage? You know, is a marriage specifically

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Speaker 1: for a man and woman to raise a child as

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Speaker 1: it's sort of historically been. Um, is it a religious

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Speaker 1: sacrament because you're doing it in a church or religious setting. Yeah,

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Speaker 1: So what exactly does the word mean to a person

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Speaker 1: who can do it and a person who is prohibited

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Speaker 1: from doing it? Now, you know, some people say, well,

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Speaker 1: I want this word to apply to me because it

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Speaker 1: has all this cultural weight, and others are saying, well,

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Speaker 1: this civil union should be good enough for you because

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Speaker 1: you have these rights and not those rights, right, But

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Speaker 1: at the same time, like if you don't allow someone

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Speaker 1: to I mean, a marriage is the most public pronouncement

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Speaker 1: of your commitment to someone that you can make. So

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Speaker 1: by virtue of that, like a civil union is kind

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Speaker 1: of like just having a civil union seems like second place. Yeah,

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Speaker 1: second place, just leftovers of you know, it's not it's

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Speaker 1: not quite there. But I don't think we can make

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Speaker 1: any sort of you know, decision on this terminology. We

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Speaker 1: really can't change the cultural weight of marriage. So we

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Speaker 1: wanted to look at what we could look at just

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Speaker 1: from you know, the least biased point of view, and

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Speaker 1: we decided that that was to go over the old bass. Yeah.

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Speaker 1: The Constitution. Yeah, I was kind of surprised. I'm looking

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Speaker 1: at the legal precedents that have led us up to

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Speaker 1: um this big landmark cases UM in Massachusetts for instance,

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Speaker 1: where they first uh legalized civil unions, and I was

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Speaker 1: surprised that it all comes down to this question of

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Speaker 1: whether or not the Constitution grants us a right to privacy,

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Speaker 1: because there is no place that explicitly states, you know,

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Speaker 1: citizens the US are have a right to privacy. Yeah,

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Speaker 1: so it all has to do with judicial interpretation of

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Speaker 1: the constitution right. And this is you know, like Kristen said,

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Speaker 1: I was surprised that it all came down to this

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Speaker 1: right as well, because I'm used to hearing about right

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Speaker 1: to privacy UM in relation to abortion often. I've got

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Speaker 1: legal scholars whould tell me, you know, a case like

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Speaker 1: row b. Wade is not well structured because we have

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Speaker 1: no constitutional right to privacy. And this is the same

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Speaker 1: argument that UM underlies this whole issue. So let's start

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Speaker 1: off with one of the biggest cases that says that

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Speaker 1: we do have some sort of fundamental privacy as US citizens,

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Speaker 1: and that's Grizzwold to be Connecticut. And we should say

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Speaker 1: that this information is coming from the Pew Research Center,

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Speaker 1: which is a nonprofit, nonpartisan research group. So with that

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Speaker 1: Grizzwold versus Connecticut nineteen sixty five, this is all about

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Speaker 1: Connecticut law prohibiting the sale and use of birth control.

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Speaker 1: And so this was the case charging that that was

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Speaker 1: unconstitutional because it intruded on the right to marital privacy right.

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Speaker 1: And so in ryan this majority opinion that Justice Waymo

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Speaker 1: Douglas asserts that that that married couples. Do you have

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Speaker 1: a right to privacy? Not because the Constitution says it,

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Speaker 1: but because that there are provisions sort of relating to

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Speaker 1: it that you could say now applied to this modern standard,

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Speaker 1: like if we have a third Amendment right to refuse

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Speaker 1: to quarters all just during peace time, then that means,

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Speaker 1: you know, you have some sort of right to close

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Speaker 1: your door to the world and say, you know, I'm

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Speaker 1: not letting you in. And he says that what amendments

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Speaker 1: like that do are cast pannumbras or shadows onto where

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Speaker 1: we can reasonably believe them to exist, the home being

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Speaker 1: one of them. And then in nineteen sixty seven, we

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Speaker 1: have another famous case UM Loving versus Virginia, and this

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Speaker 1: was a challenge to a Virginia law banning interracial marriage.

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Speaker 1: And I thought that this case was really interesting because

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Speaker 1: some people have compared UM the this question over gay

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Speaker 1: marriage to um uh interracial marriage back in the day

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Speaker 1: when it was illegal for UM blacks and whites to mary.

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Speaker 1: It was sort of the same argument of separate med

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Speaker 1: equal being treated like second class citizens and UM. The

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Speaker 1: court ruled that the law violated the Fourteenth Amendment equal

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Speaker 1: protection clause, and I thought that this was um interesting

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Speaker 1: from Chief Justice Earl Warren. He wrote, the freedom to

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Speaker 1: marry has long been recognized as one of the vital

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Speaker 1: personal rights essential to the orderly pursuit of happiness by

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Speaker 1: free men. Marriage is one of the basic civil rights

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Speaker 1: of men, fundamental to our very existence and survival. Yeah,

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Speaker 1: so some pretty weighty stuff. That weighty stuff. But then

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Speaker 1: I mean, you've got people who come in and say

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Speaker 1: survival means that it's a man and a woman having

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Speaker 1: children to continue the species. So it's still I don't know,

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Speaker 1: so it's it's so loaded. Still get down to semantics.

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Speaker 1: Semantics alright, Christen, let's turn away from semantics to everyone's

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Speaker 1: favorite subject, sodomy. Alright, something that happened in our own

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Speaker 1: backyardsnomy and Georgia. Sonomy and Georgia. That is where we're

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Speaker 1: doing our podcast today. So it so let's give our

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Speaker 1: our history a shout out with the case case of

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Speaker 1: Bowers versus Hardwick. Yeah, not the not the best historical

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Speaker 1: shout out to Atlanta because basically, the Atlanta police arrested

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Speaker 1: um a gay couple for having consensual sex um in

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Speaker 1: their in their homes. Awesome Atlanta. Unfortunately, Georgia at the

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Speaker 1: time had some anti sodomy laws, as did many states.

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Speaker 1: Uh leftover relics and um, you know, the state dropped

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Speaker 1: its case against Hardwick, but Hardwick suthed the state, alleging

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Speaker 1: that it was a criminal act to come into his

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Speaker 1: home violates his constitutional right to privacy if he's doing

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Speaker 1: this in his home consentually, And in a five to

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Speaker 1: four ruling, the Supreme Court rule that the constitutional right

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Speaker 1: to privacy did not protect the right to have private,

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Speaker 1: consensual sex with a person of the same gender, which

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Speaker 1: to me, that kind of blows my mind because it

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Speaker 1: is not until two thousand three with the case of

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Speaker 1: Lawrence v. Texas that it takes on the similar sodomy laws.

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Speaker 1: And then the Supreme Court finally overruled the Bowers decision

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Speaker 1: and invalidated not only texas Is anti sodomy laws, but

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Speaker 1: all state anti sodomy laws two thousand and three. Molly, Well,

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Speaker 1: they're saying that in that time, that was when states

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Speaker 1: were like, oh, we didn't realize we had all these

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Speaker 1: sodomy laws. You know, times have changed. Okay, now we'll

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Speaker 1: admit sodomy's okay, but I do want to go back. Um,

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Speaker 1: you know, it was a bitterly divided opinion Powers versus Hardwick,

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Speaker 1: and I did like this thing from the dissent of

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Speaker 1: in that opinion, Justice Blackman, who wrote that by just

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Speaker 1: focusing on the homosexual aspect of the sodomy you were

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Speaker 1: distorting the ultimate question before the court by ignoring the

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Speaker 1: fact that the George's Statue outlooks outlaws sodomy between heterosexuals

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Speaker 1: as well as homosexuals. But the case actually concerned, he wrote,

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Speaker 1: was the most comprehensive of rights and the right most

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Speaker 1: valued by civilized men, namely the right to be let alone.

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Speaker 1: So by focusing the case on whether you could in

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Speaker 1: fact have sodomy, it just it distorted the cases his opinion. Yeah,

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Speaker 1: And then, um, I think there's also an interesting point

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Speaker 1: that Justice Kennedy makes when he was writing on the

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Speaker 1: Lawrence versus Texas decision in two thousand three, and he

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Speaker 1: said that gay people have quote liberty under the due

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Speaker 1: process clause. It gives them the full right to engage

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Speaker 1: in intimate conduct without intervention of the government. Now, the

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Speaker 1: thing is that all these cases of course garnered attention

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Speaker 1: and criticism because you're always going to have this argument. Um,

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Speaker 1: of how much a edge can change law and how

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Speaker 1: much a judge is just supposed to interpret the law.

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Speaker 1: And a lot of these cases that we've mentioned have

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Speaker 1: been criticized um as cases of judicial activism, where these

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Speaker 1: judges are finding things that really don't exist in the

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Speaker 1: Constitution and and putting them in place. So it's worth

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Speaker 1: mentioning that even though we're citing these as, you know,

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Speaker 1: the standards, not everyone who agree that these are the

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Speaker 1: best standards. Yeah, I mean, I also don't know how

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Speaker 1: you how a judge can on at some point revise

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Speaker 1: the law based on interpretation, not because of what is

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Speaker 1: explicitly stated in the Constitution, because or else we would

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Speaker 1: have so many antiquated laws on our books and our

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Speaker 1: society would be even more backward than it already is.

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Speaker 1: But that's the kind of statement that I'm hoping the

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Speaker 1: constitutional people write in and tell us why, why that's

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Speaker 1: a wrong idea? Yeah, what's what's so come on constitutional leverage?

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Speaker 1: What's use? Um So, that though, takes us up to

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Speaker 1: a very landmark case just Goodridge versus the Massachusetts Department

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Speaker 1: of Public Health. And this is when the Massachusetts Supreme

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Speaker 1: Judicial Court rule that the state's constitution requires the government

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Speaker 1: to offer quote the protections, benefits, and obligations conferred by

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Speaker 1: civil marriage. Civil marriage. Note that's civil to two individuals

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Speaker 1: of the same sex who wish to marry. Big deal.

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Speaker 1: This is a big deal. And in writing for the

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Speaker 1: majority of the Chief Justice Margaret Marshall held that denying

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Speaker 1: marriage benefits to same sex couples violated the state constitution

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Speaker 1: because it didn't accomplish a legitimate government goal. And by that,

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Speaker 1: the Court explained that the reasons the government offered for

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Speaker 1: banning same sex marriage um in terms of like promoting procreation,

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Speaker 1: ensuring good child rearing environment, and preserving the state's financial resources,

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Speaker 1: which are all basically why we have the government institution

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Speaker 1: of marriage right now. Um, it would not be promoted

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Speaker 1: by prohibiting same sex couples to marry, because you can't

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Speaker 1: say that two people of the same sex in a

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Speaker 1: marital relation and ship could not still provide all of

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Speaker 1: those things, even though some of them just claim that

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Speaker 1: it will. Yeah, but again, that's not the argument we're

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Speaker 1: gonna make. So they're saying that you can't condemn a

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Speaker 1: lifestyle as a constitutionally adequate reason for denying marriage benefits

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Speaker 1: it doesn't affect these other couples. So if you were

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Speaker 1: to say no, you can't do this, that is a

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Speaker 1: constitutional violation. Yeah. And so then after after Massachusetts, we

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Speaker 1: have UM other states in New England who also UM

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Speaker 1: pass laws allowing civil unions. And now we also have

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Speaker 1: states that like Iowa, that allow same sex marriage. And

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Speaker 1: most recently, I think the most famous UM court case

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Speaker 1: that has come up was UH in last year's elections

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Speaker 1: with a very contentious Proposition eight issue, where California had

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Speaker 1: passed a law to allow same sex marriage, and then

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Speaker 1: UM anti gay marriage activists UM pushed the sing called

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Speaker 1: Proposition eight onto UH the ballot that year, and they

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Speaker 1: had a referendum and the people voted down the same

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Speaker 1: sex marriage legislation. Yeah, and I thought that you pointed

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Speaker 1: out a pretty interesting difference between the good Ridge and

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Speaker 1: California decisions. UM. The Massachusetts court and good Ridge found

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Speaker 1: a right to same sex marriage on the ground that

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Speaker 1: there's no rational basis for denying marital rights to same

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Speaker 1: sex couples, but the California court went significantly further, elevating

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Speaker 1: gays and lesbians to have the same protected legal status

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Speaker 1: as racial minorities and women. So it just ties in

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Speaker 1: how you view this battle, I think. But you know,

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Speaker 1: one thing we kind of scripped over christen Um was

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Speaker 1: what happened in Hawaii in the ninety nines, and that's

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Speaker 1: how we we sort of got DOMA in the first place.

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Speaker 1: The Defensive Marriage Act, yes that you had read earlier. UM. Basically,

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Speaker 1: Hawaii had interpreted their constitution to show that same sex

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Speaker 1: couples did receive the same rights and benefits of marriage.

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Speaker 1: And this sort of freaked people out because they thought

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Speaker 1: everyone would just fly to Hawaii and come back with

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Speaker 1: a merritor certificate that they were going to have to

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Speaker 1: honor as a state. I mean, that sounds like it

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Speaker 1: could be really good for Hawaii tourism, but I be

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Speaker 1: not so good for people when they came back and

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Speaker 1: wanted you know, the tax breaks, um, the Social Security benefits, etcetera.

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Speaker 1: So that's why there was this push to have this

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Speaker 1: federal mandate that you know, if if you came back

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Speaker 1: with the marriagtuch to gate from Hawaii, you know it's

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Speaker 1: not go. CRASCA didn't have to recognize it. UM. So

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Speaker 1: that brings us pretty much up to Maine in the

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Speaker 1: present day and so right now on the books, what

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Speaker 1: we've got in the United States, our Massachusetts, Connecticut, Iowa, Vermont,

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Speaker 1: and New Hampshire begins in January one, two thousand and ten,

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Speaker 1: to allow same sex couples to marry and have no

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Speaker 1: residency requirement. In addition, the Netherlands, Belgium, Spain, South Africa, Norway,

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Speaker 1: and Sweden allows same sex couples to marry, but most

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Speaker 1: of these countries have requirements, so you really can't fly

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Speaker 1: in just for a Belgian wedding and some and some

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Speaker 1: fries and some beer and then leave and and have

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Speaker 1: it recognized. But Canada has become this icon of a

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Speaker 1: place where you can get married, have no residency requirement

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Speaker 1: and then um, if you go home, the mary will

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Speaker 1: be recognized in Massachusett, Connecticut, Iowa, Vermont, and New Hampshire

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Speaker 1: starting in yeah and right now at least six states

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Speaker 1: outside of New England have same sex marriage bills before

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Speaker 1: their legislature for this legislative term, but uh, none are

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Speaker 1: expected to pass. And see this gets into you know,

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Speaker 1: there's I think this conversation right now about how you

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Speaker 1: go about getting um gay marriage to be allowed more places.

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Speaker 1: They're trying to do this state by state thing, and

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Speaker 1: you know, the New York Times is trying that this

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Speaker 1: main decision has some people thinking that this is not

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Speaker 1: the right tap to take, But you don't want to

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Speaker 1: just go straight to the Supreme Court and risk of

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Speaker 1: them outlying it forever. More right, It's such a complicated

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Speaker 1: UM issue when you start looking at all of the

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Speaker 1: legal background, because while it does seem like, you know,

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Speaker 1: the best fixed would be something akin to Roe v. Wade,

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Speaker 1: you know, making a federal statue that legalizes gay marriage

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Speaker 1: across you know, all fifties states at the same time.

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Speaker 1: That would also take away from state sovereignty, which is

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Speaker 1: very important for our democracy as well. Yeah, but we're

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Speaker 1: no legal scholars, which is why I thought this was

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Speaker 1: pretty you know, interesting to look back at the history

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Speaker 1: of the lego part. And I'm hoping our listen listeners

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Speaker 1: will write in not so much with a religious defense

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Speaker 1: of one position or another, but just how you think

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Speaker 1: this shakes down legally. Samalia I ran across also UM

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Speaker 1: an interesting paper written by a Yale legal scholar who

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Speaker 1: suggested that instead of same sex marriage, she thinks that

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Speaker 1: the language is just it's it's it's problematic. Um and

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Speaker 1: she suggests that and says, same sex marriage, we should

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Speaker 1: call it genderless marriage. UM. And she says because for

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Speaker 1: two reasons. She says, first, nowhere in the world is

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Speaker 1: marriage defined legally, socially, or otherwise as a union of

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Speaker 1: two persons of the same sex. Is defined either as

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Speaker 1: the union of any two persons, as in Massachusetts, or

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Speaker 1: as the union of a man and a woman, as

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Speaker 1: in UM with the forty forty nine states outside of Massachusetts.

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Speaker 1: And she says, second, when people confront the marriage issue,

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Speaker 1: the term same sex marriage and others like it will

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Speaker 1: offer and prompt them to think of a new, different

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Speaker 1: and separate marriage arrangement or institution like civil unions, UM,

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Speaker 1: that will co exist with the old man woman marriage institution.

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Speaker 1: But she thinks that with generalist marriage there can really

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Speaker 1: only be it can apply to everyone. Right, although you

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Speaker 1: did send me um some information UM from the other

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Speaker 1: side about how opening up that definition is like a

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Speaker 1: slippery slope of you know, according to some people, will

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Speaker 1: eventually people want to marry like a horse. Right. That

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Speaker 1: was from Yeah, that was a clip from the family

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Speaker 1: very Conservative Family Research Council that says, quote, but once

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Speaker 1: marriage is no longer confined to a man and a woman.

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Speaker 1: It is impossible to exclude virtually any relationship between two

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Speaker 1: or more partners of eater sex, even non human partners,

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Speaker 1: which sounds ridiculous. I mean, we we're trying to present

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Speaker 1: us in an unbased way. But but once again, you

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Speaker 1: know that that that also gets into the very contentious

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Speaker 1: political debate um and and religious debate. I think it

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Speaker 1: all kind of ties to together because marriage is something

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Speaker 1: that is so central to human culture right everywhere, right,

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Speaker 1: and so it should be a big deal. Yeah, But

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Speaker 1: treating people as second class citizens by not extending them

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Speaker 1: the same basic civil rights um as other people, does

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Speaker 1: seem a little messed up, may I say? And you know,

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Speaker 1: we've been trying to avoid going into various religious viewpoints

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Speaker 1: on this, but you know, I was raised that marriage

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Speaker 1: was a sacrament of the church, and it seems that

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Speaker 1: there are people who are not religious who get to

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Speaker 1: use the word marriage. So I wouldn't mind everyone getting

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Speaker 1: to have the civil union and then religious people getting

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Speaker 1: to have the marriage. And if you're too people of

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Speaker 1: the same gender, if you've got a church that's willing

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Speaker 1: to recognize that, that's one thing. And if you know

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Speaker 1: if you're not religious in your mail and a woman

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Speaker 1: man and a woman, just go down to the courthouse yourself.

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Speaker 1: See that still complicates things, because why do we need

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Speaker 1: to have separate categories in the first place. I mean,

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Speaker 1: I just don't I don't think we're ever going to

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Speaker 1: be able to get rid of replace marriage with something else.

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Speaker 1: You know, it's it's been around far too long. But

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Speaker 1: you know, if you just want to just cut through

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Speaker 1: all the all the bs, just get a domestic partnership,

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Speaker 1: well it tastes you just have to go and say

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Speaker 1: that you're over eighteen and I love each other and

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Speaker 1: sign some papers. Yes, it's so romantic, and then you

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Speaker 1: go on to get your domestic partnership and then if

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Speaker 1: you want to, if you want to break up, because

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Speaker 1: if you this was one thing I was wondering, how

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Speaker 1: do you dissolve a civil union? Is it the same way?

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Speaker 1: And according to Vermont law, sattled in the exact same

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Speaker 1: way as as a divorce. You know what I liked

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Speaker 1: is that, um, let's say you you have this crazy

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Speaker 1: idea to run off to Canada and get married, and

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Speaker 1: then all of a sudden you want to get divorced.

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Speaker 1: One of you has to live there for a year.

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Speaker 1: So it's very easy to get married in Canada, very

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Speaker 1: hard to get divorced, but you gotta hang out there

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Speaker 1: for a while. Year's not bad, Molly, I think, definitely

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Speaker 1: the year in Canada. But again that's OK. That's just

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Speaker 1: a personal thing way like Canada, which is why Molly,

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Speaker 1: I think that we should do away with husbands and

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Speaker 1: wives and spouses just call your little lovers. Oh, I

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Speaker 1: worry about marriage anyway, that's too short because of all

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Speaker 1: this cultural pressure. That's the kind of stuff we unload

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Speaker 1: every week on mom's stuff. Yes, but you know, again,

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Speaker 1: we tried to be unbiased, but I'm sure there are

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Speaker 1: people thought there was some strong opinions. Let us know

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Speaker 1: where we may be screwed up with our interpretation of

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Speaker 1: the law. Yeah, what you think the word should be?

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Speaker 1: Should it be lover like Kristen suggests, or should it

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Speaker 1: be something like? I don't even have a suggestion. That

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Speaker 1: we're not asking you, but if anything, we hope that

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Speaker 1: you all did find it. The legal background to its

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Speaker 1: interesting is Molly and I did because now I know

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Speaker 1: the difference between a marriage and a civil union, and

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Speaker 1: it's all about state and Federal Disunion. I guess yeah,

431
00:22:47,840 --> 00:22:49,960
Speaker 1: and I know a lot more about the laws regarding sodomy.

432
00:22:50,119 --> 00:22:53,200
Speaker 1: Always handy, always a good party conversation trick. How about

433
00:22:53,200 --> 00:22:56,080
Speaker 1: that sodomy? Do you know your laws regarding sodomy? Okay,

434
00:22:56,800 --> 00:23:00,159
Speaker 1: on that note, let's just yeah, let's do it is

435
00:23:00,160 --> 00:23:03,120
Speaker 1: a subject because it's getting it's getting awkward in this studio.

436
00:23:03,800 --> 00:23:06,639
Speaker 1: Let's do some listener mail. Okay, all right, I have

437
00:23:07,280 --> 00:23:11,520
Speaker 1: um an email here from a young man Andy. So.

438
00:23:11,640 --> 00:23:14,720
Speaker 1: Andy was circumcised as a baby and he is now

439
00:23:14,760 --> 00:23:18,240
Speaker 1: in the process of regrowing his foreskin, which we uh

440
00:23:18,480 --> 00:23:22,119
Speaker 1: talked about in the show. We said that it was possible,

441
00:23:22,160 --> 00:23:24,439
Speaker 1: but we really didn't go into too much detail about it.

442
00:23:24,480 --> 00:23:27,080
Speaker 1: So Andy says that he wears a silicon device that

443
00:23:27,119 --> 00:23:30,360
Speaker 1: pulls his foreskin taught and slightly stretches it. Said, over time,

444
00:23:30,359 --> 00:23:32,760
Speaker 1: a period of a year or two, this constant stretching

445
00:23:32,800 --> 00:23:36,760
Speaker 1: will actually grow new skin. As the foreskin cells are stretched,

446
00:23:37,000 --> 00:23:39,960
Speaker 1: new ones actually grow in the gaps, making the stretching permanent.

447
00:23:40,280 --> 00:23:44,160
Speaker 1: The tugger that he wears can be comfortable, uncomfortable at times,

448
00:23:44,359 --> 00:23:45,719
Speaker 1: and sometimes he has to take it off, and in

449
00:23:45,720 --> 00:23:47,639
Speaker 1: general he tries to wear it close to twenty four

450
00:23:47,720 --> 00:23:49,879
Speaker 1: hours a day if possible. He says, I'm in the

451
00:23:49,880 --> 00:23:52,399
Speaker 1: middle of the process and can see a distinct and

452
00:23:52,440 --> 00:23:56,040
Speaker 1: remarkable growth of the foreskin, the glands change from a cracked,

453
00:23:56,160 --> 00:24:00,720
Speaker 1: dry skin ouch to a smoother, healthier looking and feeling skin,

454
00:24:01,640 --> 00:24:04,040
Speaker 1: and overall he was very dispointed that he was circumcised

455
00:24:04,080 --> 00:24:06,760
Speaker 1: as a child and hopes that parents will leave the

456
00:24:06,800 --> 00:24:12,080
Speaker 1: decision to their baby boys when they grow up. Kind interesting. Thanks, Andy,

457
00:24:12,200 --> 00:24:15,919
Speaker 1: I've got another circumcision email from Stewart who says, unlike

458
00:24:15,920 --> 00:24:18,280
Speaker 1: my father, I was not circumcised. Our family doctor at

459
00:24:18,280 --> 00:24:20,159
Speaker 1: the time recommended against it, and at this point in

460
00:24:20,160 --> 00:24:21,920
Speaker 1: my life, I'm very grateful my parents listened to the

461
00:24:21,920 --> 00:24:24,640
Speaker 1: medical professional. But I did not always have this opinion.

462
00:24:24,960 --> 00:24:28,240
Speaker 1: Growing up in the mid eighties as an uncircumcised, uncircumcised boy,

463
00:24:28,240 --> 00:24:29,879
Speaker 1: I was very awkward. The first time I used the

464
00:24:29,880 --> 00:24:33,119
Speaker 1: communal showers after gym class was traumatic of my entire class.

465
00:24:33,119 --> 00:24:34,919
Speaker 1: I was then only boy with hoar skin, so I

466
00:24:35,000 --> 00:24:37,040
Speaker 1: was the freak for quite a while. However, with the

467
00:24:37,119 --> 00:24:40,119
Speaker 1: number of circumcisions steadily decreasing and access to information far

468
00:24:40,200 --> 00:24:42,880
Speaker 1: greater than back then, I surmised that the new generation

469
00:24:42,920 --> 00:24:45,040
Speaker 1: of men won't suffer the same treatment. So to those

470
00:24:45,040 --> 00:24:47,520
Speaker 1: fathers out there insisting on circumcising their sons so they

471
00:24:47,520 --> 00:24:50,760
Speaker 1: don't suffer the same hum humiliation they witnessed dished out

472
00:24:50,880 --> 00:24:54,399
Speaker 1: or themselves received, times have changed, don't worry about it.

473
00:24:54,760 --> 00:24:56,600
Speaker 1: He writes that from my experience, I concur with your

474
00:24:56,600 --> 00:24:58,960
Speaker 1: statement that cleanliness is the most important thing for a

475
00:24:59,000 --> 00:25:02,200
Speaker 1: parent to teach their new baby boy. And then this um,

476
00:25:02,200 --> 00:25:05,159
Speaker 1: why do you write sipping a little bit, Stewart, remember

477
00:25:05,200 --> 00:25:10,600
Speaker 1: your old circumcision index that you formulated. Christen Stewart writes that,

478
00:25:10,680 --> 00:25:12,560
Speaker 1: you know, we mentioned that circumcisions were done in the

479
00:25:12,600 --> 00:25:15,400
Speaker 1: US partially because of the recession, but they're also dramatically

480
00:25:15,440 --> 00:25:18,040
Speaker 1: done in Canada, which, as you know, has a social

481
00:25:18,080 --> 00:25:20,840
Speaker 1: health care system where the procedures free. Here, it would

482
00:25:20,840 --> 00:25:22,600
Speaker 1: indicate that a lack of money may not be a

483
00:25:22,600 --> 00:25:25,320
Speaker 1: major reason more parents and Western cultures are choosing to

484
00:25:25,359 --> 00:25:30,320
Speaker 1: forego the procedure. So much for the circumcision index, But

485
00:25:30,359 --> 00:25:32,040
Speaker 1: if there are other things that we've said you'd like

486
00:25:32,080 --> 00:25:34,680
Speaker 1: to prove or disprove, send us an email. Mom Stuff

487
00:25:34,720 --> 00:25:37,480
Speaker 1: at how stuff works dot com. Check out our blog

488
00:25:37,640 --> 00:25:40,600
Speaker 1: how to stuff, where we write daily on how to

489
00:25:40,720 --> 00:25:44,199
Speaker 1: do things. Should you ask for anything more useful? No,

490
00:25:44,800 --> 00:25:47,320
Speaker 1: I'm shaking my head and she has. And if you

491
00:25:47,320 --> 00:25:49,159
Speaker 1: just want to learn more about marriage and all the

492
00:25:49,200 --> 00:25:51,960
Speaker 1: cultural weight that that implies, head on over to how

493
00:25:52,040 --> 00:25:58,960
Speaker 1: stuff works dot com for more on this and thousands

494
00:25:58,960 --> 00:26:02,679
Speaker 1: of other topics. Is a how stuff works dot Com.

495
00:26:02,920 --> 00:26:05,639
Speaker 1: Want more how stuff works, check out our blogs on

496
00:26:05,760 --> 00:26:12,639
Speaker 1: the house. Stuff works dot com home page. Brought to

497
00:26:12,680 --> 00:26:15,760
Speaker 1: you by the reinvented two thousand twelve camera. It's ready,

498
00:26:15,960 --> 00:26:16,360
Speaker 1: are you