The state with the 3rd highest divorce rate host "Celebration of Marriage"

[LynneSin]

Hypocrisy thy name is Governor Mike Huckabee and the idiots that hosted this farce!!

http://www.salon.com/news/feature/2005/02/15/covenant/index.html

A dispatch from the culture war
Gay Arkansans protest Gov. Mike Huckabee's hetero-only "Celebration of Marriage."

- - - - - - - - - - - -
By Michelle Goldberg



Feb. 15, 2005 | Holding on to her husband's arm, a middle-aged woman in a white wedding veil and sparkly makeup beamed as she walked past a cluster of protesters outside the Alltel Arena in Little Rock, Ark. The couple joined thousands of others, all streaming into the stadium for a Valentine's Day "Celebration of Marriage" hosted by Arkansas Gov. Mike Huckabee and his wife, Janet. Those who weren't welcome at the governor's celebration -- gay couples like Robert Loyd and John Schenck, together for 30 years and recently wed in Toronto -- took the event as a personal rebuke. After all, just a few months ago, Arkansas voted overwhelmingly to ban both gay marriage and domestic partnerships -- all in the name of preserving the institution of marriage.

"I can't marry my Valentine," said one sign. "Get a new Valentine," one woman, a celebrant, shouted as she walked in.

The Huckabees had invited every God-fearing heterosexual in the state to watch them upgrade their union into a "covenant marriage," a type of marriage that's very difficult to get out of. Covenant marriages are one of the right's attempts to shore up traditional matrimony, something that appears especially embattled in Bible Belt states like Arkansas, where divorce rates are soaring.

The sad state of marriage in Arkansas, which has America's third-highest divorce rate, led Huckabee, a former Baptist minister, to declare a "marital emergency" in 2000 and pledge to halve the number of divorces in a decade. As part of that effort, he pushed for the state's covenant marriage law, which essentially forecloses the option of no-fault divorce for participating couples. "Only when there has been a complete and total breach of the marital covenant commitment may a party seek a declaration that the marriage is no longer legally recognized," the 2001 law says. Such a breach can include physical abuse, imprisonment or "habitual drunkenness for one year."

People aren't exactly flocking to covenant marriages. Two other states, Louisiana and Arizona, also have such laws, but only a tiny percentage of couples are participating. Huckabee hopes to change that. Before his Valentine's Day rally, the governor toured the state with the co-host of the event, Dennis Rainey, head of the Arkansas-based ministry FamilyLife, a division of the Campus Crusade for Christ. Together, they encouraged pastors to refuse to perform noncovenant marriages in their churches. The churches, in turn, organized fleets of buses to take their congregants to Alltel for a kind of religious revival as scripted by Hallmark.


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[Freedom_from_Chains]

1. A prelude to outlawing divorce?

Think I'm kidding, I wouldn't put anything past these people if they are allowed to gain enough political power.

[Cannikin]

2. I'm so proud to be a gay arkie.... I'm moving to Buffalo

If I can get over the wall and past the guards here

[Art_from_Ark]

3. I made it over the walls years ago.

Best of luck to you!

(Cue theme song of "The Great Escape")

[ClintonTyree]

10. Good luck...............

you'll be very happy in Buffalo (except for the weather). Canada is right next door, you'll feel 10 years younger.

[TaleWgnDg]

4. So-called "covenant marriages" are a farce . . .

.
So-called "covenant marriages" are a farce . . . and they are based on a false premise as well.

Covenant marriages are a re-institution of "fault divorces" with a very narrow choice of "faults" to dissolve a marriage together with a longer "cooling off" timeframe (in order to procure a divorce). Are you with me, here?

This premise about making-divorce-harder-to-obtain thus there will be less divorces is a farce. It's a false premise.

Why? Why do I say that? Because as a Massachusetts "divorce lawyer," I can knowledgeably state that Massachusetts has the lowest divorce rate in the entire country. Yes, Massachusetts -- that bastion of liberalism -- has the lowest divorce rate in the nation.

And that very low divorce rate in Massachusetts involves "no fault" divorce which means one may obtain a divorce without claiming a "fault" (as w/ a "convenant marriage") or other "fault" divorces in other states.

In addition, Massachusetts is the sole state that grants same-sex marriage! Thus, although Massachusetts divorces may be "easier" to obtain, less Bay Staters seek divorces!

This blows holes throughout these so-called "covenant marriages" and all its false claims couched in religion-in-law from religious-righties.

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edited to add: And, oh, yeah, did I say that "covenant marriages" will lead to more not less litigation? Oh. Isn't that what GWBush *blames* us, lawyers, for? It's not the stupid ppl who ask for and get these laws enacted, it's the lawyers!? Oh. Maybe the "cure" will be "tort reform?" :crazy:

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[Inland]

7. I always thought the answer is to make it more difficult to get married

That's the aim of, say, precana counseling. Sometimes the counselors tell you to not do it. But the rightwingers' only solution to premarital sex is to get married at 18, so they will never accept a counseling that says, wait, don't do it. So they get married early and divorced early.

[TaleWgnDg]

12. Sad but true re religious-righties early marriage that, then,

lead to divorce. Yup.

[wolfgirl]

5. I am tired of these

self-righteous idiots. I've been married 30 years this April, but I wasn't married in a church but at the Justice of the Peace's ofc at the courthouse. So from now on, I'm descrbing my relationship with my hubby/partner as a civil union not a marriage.


We must frame the debate not these yahoos!

[Ezlivin]

8. Another J.O.P.er checking in

My wife and I hit our 27th anniversary in November.

Our marriage cost us $26 at the Justice of the Peace.

Why do people seem hellbent on denying others the right to enter a monogamous relationship? We need more "lovers" in the world, not fewer!

[dbt]

6. Huckabee is SUCH a running joke.

Remind me to tell y'all about the Triplewide Governor's Mansion sometime. Then there's that business about calling Arkansas a "Banana Republic" on the Imus show a few years back and refusing to apologize to the state that lawfully elected his dumb ass!

Feckin Eejit.

:evilgrin:
dbt
Friendship, Arkansas
Population 206, not counting dogs.

PS: Reckon why his wife is referred to here as Jethrine?

[Art_from_Ark]

13. Ah, Guv'nor Triplewide

Did they ever git the guv'nor's man-shun all spiffied up, like they promised? Or did they jest decide ta use that triplewide out back as the new guv'nor's man-shun?

[Cannikin]

9. Did you see this on the Daily Show last night?

The gov. and the first lady looked better when they were fat. They look AWEFUL now. Like someone let the air out of them.

[LynneSin]

11. Here's some interesting stats I found about divorce

http://www.religioustolerance.org/chr_dira.htm

Divorce rates amongst religious/non-religious groups:
Religion % have been divorced
Jews 30%
Born-again Christians 27%
Other Christians 24%
Atheists, Agnostics 21%


Divorce rates by Region of the Country:
Area % are or have been divorced
South 27%
Midwest 27%
West 26%
Northeast 19%


Comparison of Divorce between a Solidly Blue Region of the country and a Solidly Red region of the country:

5.1% - 11 southern states (AL, AR, AZ, FL, GA, MS, NC, NM, OK, SC and TX averaged 5.1/1000 people. (LA data is not available; TX data is for 1997).

3.5% - Nine states in the Northeast (CT, MA, ME, NH, NJ, NY, PA, RI, VT) averaged only 3.5/1000 people.