Same sex partnerships

Many questions are coming in through the website and not just from the Hexham constituency either. Here’s one that came in last night:

What’s your view on same sex partnerships? Civil legal partnerships and religious inclusion for example. Why do you think prop 8 succeeded in c.a? Do you think it was purely the public doubting it would ever get passed in the first place?

I replied:

Same sex partnerships: I am heterosexual, married and have grown up children. During my time as a GP, I had quite a number of gay, lesbian, transgendered and bisexual patients.

Several of these patients were in settled relationships but to the best of my knowledge none were in formal civil partnerships. They seemed entirely happy. I am strongly supportive of people thinking and acting autonomously – including the choices they make about relationships. How or why people bring themselves to think that they can or should express disapproval of so personal a choice is quite beyond me.

Introducing a religious dimension complicates the picture. In conventional terms I am an Anglican/Protestant but am probably better placed in the deist category. My knowledge of theology is insufficient to comment authoritatively on the many doctrinal nuances. There seems to me an inherent incompatibility between the hostility of some religious opinion and the general themes of love, tolerance, compassion, forgiveness and the infinite love of God that are so much to the fore in the Bible, Koran and Torah.

Proposition 8 – Californians… what more can one say? The risks inherent in guesstimating the worldview/mindset of Californians are greater than the benefits gained. The nature and idiosyncracy of State and Federal politics in the USA is almost beyond telling.

Condemning the lifestyle choices of others is a path fraught with moral and ethical hazard. Live and let live seems better to me.

Tags: Same sex partnerships