[onetwo_threefour]

I have always been socially liberal, and as long as I have been aware that marriage was an institution that some gay people wanted to join, I have been in favour. I briefly flirted with the 'get government out of marriage altogether' camp, but it was never about denying gays full participation in the social institution. It was about the historic nature of marriage being something that a modern society might want to distance itself from; dowry/chattels, arranged marriages, marriage by rape, all being things that could be seen as tainting the institution far more than a same-sex couple getting married.