You're looking at Less Wrong's discussion board. This includes all posts, including those that haven't been promoted to the front page yet. For more information, see About Less Wrong.

DanArmak comments on Poly marriage? - Less Wrong Discussion

-9 Post author: h-H 06 June 2012 07:57PM

You are viewing a comment permalink. View the original post to see all comments and the full post content.

Comments (127)

You are viewing a single comment's thread. Show more comments above.

Comment author: DanArmak 07 June 2012 07:03:31PM 3 points [-]

Marriage isn't just boilerplate for private agreements. It gives married people legal privileges: custody of children, hospital visiting rights, rights to decide partner's medical treatment in an emergency, tax reductions in some jurisdictions (usually for joint-owned property or for inheritance between the married partners), and so on.

Lack of good boilerplate for marriage-like agreements isn't the problem. In many states, private agreements cannot grant most of these legal rights. That's why abolishing government-defined and -controlled marriage is a prerequisite to equal-rights private agreements.