“Hostility to gay marriage is fundamentally anti-liberty, as it asserts the power of the state to intervene in private relationships.”

Maybe, but it’s pretty authoritatian to enforce gay marriage by law, especially when a significant portion of religious institutions fundamentally oppose gay marriage.

Spot on chris. Good piece.

A very good point. Generally speaking, UKIP’s concerns are those of the Daily Mail and Sun – in other words, they are the exact concerns the Tories and their allies have tried to promote to the average newspaper reader as things they should be worried out – areas in which too-clever-by-half leftist establishment types are trying to put one over on the common man.

Which while it’s depressing in one way does have a certain irony about it. UKIP are basically claiming they’ll enact David Cameron’s campaign promises…

Boar:

So anything which is not banned can be described as “enforced by law”?

In that case, I think it’s terribly draconian to enforce the consumption of beef by law (I mean, hey, it’s not banned, so it must be ‘enforced by law’). A significant proportion of left-wingers fundamentally oppose the eating of meat.

@Boar #1:

Maybe, but it’s pretty authoritatian to enforce gay marriage by law, especially when a significant portion of religious institutions fundamentally oppose gay marriage.

Is my compulsory gay marriage going to be additional to or in substitution for my existing heterosexual marriage; ditto my wife’s? When do I have to have the marriage; will someone get in touch with me to tell me who I’m marrying and when, or can I take the initiative and choose for myself?

The problem looks like its going to be getting these marriages done; as you say, there’s a significant proportion of religious institutions that oppose gay marriage. Since the government isn’t going to to force them to provide gay marriages if they don’t want to, that’s something of the order of 23 million marriages to get through the register offices.

Will it be compulsory to have a gay marriage if you’re only visiting the UK? Will they set up registry offies at the airports so that people who only have a heterosexual marriage can get properly married before they pass through Immigration? And what if there are odd numbers on the plane; will the odd man/woman out be stopped from coming in?

So many questions… Wouldn’t it have been so much easier if the government had just decided to allow gay marriage, rather than enforcing them by law?

Was it ever meant to be anything other than a conservative party? Did I miss something? And ofcourse it’s pro-establishment but pre 1975. If I were a genuine protester i’d be looking at where left wing parties obtain their candidates but i’m not, so I don’t care at all.

Boar says:

“It’s pretty authoritatian to enforce gay marriage by law, especially when a significant portion of religious institutions fundamentally oppose gay marriage.”

But those religious institutions aren’t being forced to marry gay couples. Indeed, the CoE is explicitly banned from doing so.

Could this be the worst article Dillow has ever written …?

Steven Lukes’ third dimension of power is more applicable to authoritarian leftist regimes – from Venezuela to North Korea – than it is to the UK Indignation Party.

I am not sure what you are trying to say in this article. You seem to be just trying to rationalise their victory because it doesn’t fit with your narrative.

@5. Robin Levett: “Is my compulsory gay marriage going to be additional to or in substitution for my existing heterosexual marriage; ditto my wife’s?”

I think it is worth giving a boost to Robin’s rant.

@Charlieman #11:

Thanks – I rather enjoyed it myself. Unfortunately, it was, predictably, wasted on the nominal target.