StevieJ wrote:OTM, I'm curious to know what you thought of Stephen Harper's remarks to the effect that since the bill was likely to be passed only because of the support of the splittists, our friends Duceppe and co., its legitimacy for the whole of federal Canada would somehow be questionable.
Personally I was very surprised. I mean this a guy who was hoping to bring down the Martin government... with the support of the Bloc, as I recall.
politics politics. CPC was so off base on this, and to actually consider bringing the government down over it was insane. The geniuses at UofC at work. :roll:
Cran, most of the Provincial High Courts pronounced the current definition of marriage to be unconstitutional. So it was left to the government to either create a new definition or go around the courts by one of the fun little things you find in the Canadian System. The government tried to pass it off to THE Supreme Court of Canada, not wanting to have to make a decision (although it is clear, and they eventually figured it out, that Canadians are in favour of same-sex marriage, under the law that is) and the SCC threw it right back, telling them to do their own dirty work. The House of Commons is the Canadian Lower House, our elected members of the Federal Government. It now goes on to various Committees to hammer out something workable and to the Upper House, the appointed Senate, who will almost certainly pass it. Then Canada has a new definition of marriage. The next step is to see whether people start to call for the government to take on the various Churches for human rights violations... but that won't happen for some time. Short of it is that Canada is the third country in the world to legalize same-sex marriage.
I think this law is good. Homosexuality has always been practiced. It has been persecuted more at some times than others. I don't see the point of forcing people to live unhappy lives or unfulfilled lives. We are all the same.