Google Launches International Campaign For Recognition of Same-Sex Marriage 804
Apple and many other tech companies have offered benefits to same-sex couples (and sometimes made them a sticking point) for quite some time now, but Google is taking its position of inclusion for sexual minorities outside the company itself; the company has announced an international campaign to promote legal marriage equality for same-sex couples, called "Legalize Love." According to CNN's version of the story, while this represents Google's policies overall, the campaign will at first "focus on countries like Singapore, where certain homosexual activities are illegal, and Poland, which has no legal recognition of same-sex couples." dot429 quotes
Mark Palmer-Edgecumbe of Google, speaking in London Saturday at a summit where the initiative was announced: "We want our employees who are gay or lesbian or transgender to have the same experience outside the office as they do in the office. It is obviously a very ambitious piece of work."
Also at CNET.
I'll be impressed when... (Score:1, Insightful)
Why not start at home? (Score:5, Insightful)
What about ladyboys? (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:Faggotry (Score:3, Insightful)
Yeah, it's like those companies that hired those black people, trying to make life easier for their employees by campaigning against racism. Stupid evil companies, trying to get rid of all that great benevolent bigotry we've fought so hard for.
Bad idea (Score:5, Insightful)
Corporations should stick to their core mandate, and not get into 'social engineering'.
Be it a 'worthy' cause or not, its not their place to stick their noses into it and 'pick sides'.
Don't be evil (Score:4, Insightful)
I'll be the last to say that Google can do nothing wrong (and avoid using their services as much as I can for privacy reasons), but it's things like this that in my eyes put them a step above their competition ethically. Do we see Facebook do this? Microsoft? Apple? Same thing with withdrawing from China rather than censoring on behalf of their government, and a bunch of other examples.
Corporations aren't people, but as Google demonstrates, they can occasionally show their human face.
Re:Why not start at home? (Score:5, Insightful)
I'd mod you up if I had not already commented, here. This was exactly what I was thinking. If I were a bigot in Poland, I think I would be a bit incensed by Google telling me I have to treat LGBTs equally in my country when they aren't treated equally even in Google's own home country.
Re:Bad idea (Score:5, Insightful)
Yeah, I get so tired of companies who try to stick up for the rights of their employees. Damn them. Why can't they all just exploit their employees to the max like everyone else.
Re:So now Google is literally a bunch of faggots? (Score:5, Insightful)
OK, I am not promoting the original commenter view, but then how about 3 or more mature adults who love each other?
Why do corporations and governments have any say in who we love, live with, and raise together?
The whole gay marriage issue seems like such a tiny specific issue to have a problem with.
And the how they always bring love into it, always bugs me. Love has nothing to do with legal marriage or what homosexuals want. Homosexuals, in general, want one thing to legalise marriage and gay sex. They do not want to legalise pedo-love, bestiality, or polygamy.
Re:I'll be impressed when... (Score:5, Insightful)
The campaign will focus on countries like Singapore, where certain homosexual activities are illegal, and Poland, which has no legal recognition of same-sex couples.
It sounds like they're doing things wisely and focusing on countries in which the politics are not so turbulent and are not dominated by religious extremists. Poland and Singapore could probably be swayed. Egypt and Afghanistan obviously have bigger issues to contend with, and Afghanistan, that would be pissing money and effort away.
So I'm impressed that they seem to be taking a pragmatic approach and focusing on what they can actually do, rather than slamming their head against the biggest, sturdiest walls.
Comment removed (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:What about ladyboys? (Score:5, Insightful)
Google promoting same sex marriage is great and all, but what about ladyboys and the so called third gender? No, you cannot lump it under homosexuality as it's a different issue. Same sex marriage is old thing, everyone should fight for people's right to be whatever gender - or a third gender - if they so want to. Even on Slashdot I always get modded down when I mention ladyboys, and I hope not this time because this issue needs to see some daylight.
The distinction between straight, homosexual, bisexual, and transgender marriage should matter only to the couple that's marrying. There's no reason the government needs to make a distinction.
If a male->female part time cross dresser is in love with and wants to marry a female->male post-op transexual, why is it anyone's business but the couple? There's no need to make up another "gender", just take gender out of the marriage equation entirely.
True equality (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:True equality (Score:5, Insightful)
Why does the majority need to be promoted?
Re:Why not start at home? (Score:5, Insightful)
I believe you'll find that most non-Americans are already a bit incensed about American companies telling them how to run their country. I suspect this kind of behaviour is more likely to increase the backlash than help anyone's human rights.
Re:Marriage =/= legal union. (Score:5, Insightful)
Marriage is a religious rite [...]
This is not true for instance in Germany and many other european countries. There marriage is a legal procedure, performed by a municipal clerk. You can only go to your church, synagoge, mosque or whatever the sacred place is called in your religion to celebrate your marriage if you can show the official document sealing your marriage. Also the legal implications coming with marriage require the official procedure and the accompagnying paperwork.
Re:Why not start at home? (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Bad idea (Score:3, Insightful)
they do and google does.
corporations have no soul, no ethics, no 'feelings'.
google should just fix its own social issues and stop the damned preaching. a corporation showing 'feelings' (no, this is not a pink floyd song) is not cute, its not warming. its simply looking after its own interests.
google, like apple, wants to appear progressive. this is one current way corps do this; is to champion some ideals that their customers (or even employees) can identify with.
but make no mistake, google has no feelings or heart or soul. none of the megacorps do. this is done to better themselves, in the long run.
in short, its just an ad. like most of what google is. its an ad. it tries to buy your loyalty and emotion.
Re:What about ladyboys? (Score:0, Insightful)
It is other people's business as soon as there are tax breaks or any other government "perks" or benefits to a legally recognized union. That's because the breaks and benefits are funded by the people as a nation.
No tax breaks? No free daycare? No benefits to any union between consenting adults? No costs to tax payers? Then I don't care what you do.
Re:Bad idea (Score:5, Insightful)
But their is a difference between says all couples of any gender pairing in our emply gets benefits and campaigning to make it so everywhere.
There's a good business case to do so. If company A tries to do the right thing by granting benefits to domestic partners of all employees regardless of gender, but they compete against companies that do not do so because there's no legal requirement, then company A is at a competitive disadvantage. They could reduce benefits for their employees, or they could lobby to level the playing field for what they think is "right".
Companies lobby for lots of things that benefit themselves (tax exemptions, lax environmental laws, etc), so what's the problem with companies lobbying for something that they think is the right thing for their employees?
Re:Polygamy (Score:5, Insightful)
The main difference is in the language of marriage laws. Two consenting, non-related adults etc. etc. can get married IFF they are not of the same sex. The institution of marriage LEGALLY remains the same if the exclusion is removed, since that exclusion serves no functional purpose in the legal framework of marriage. To the law, a same-sex couple is the same as a different-sex couple that can't produce offspring (with each other).
If society decides to evolve towards polygamy, it certainly can do so, but laws and the judicial system have to changed in a much more fundamental way. The concept of divorce needs to be amended (who leaves whom? is the whole marriage severed when one of the spouses leaves? if not, who gets what?). We have to decide how biological and legal constructs matter (if X is child of A and B, who are married to each other and to C, how is the relationship between X and A different from that between X and C?).
None of those changes are too difficult to figure out, I suppose, but they are an obstacle that same-sex marriage doesn't have.
Re:So now Google is literally a bunch of faggots? (Score:5, Insightful)
They do not want to legalise pedo-love, bestiality, or polygamy.
Marriage confers rights that the state blocks from others. The issue isn't who can get married, but why the right to be "next of kin" is banned from private contracts, and only allowed in contracts "blessed" but the state. beastiality isn't marriage. That's like saying you should be able to marry your hand. Or poligimatically marry both hands. You hand can't consent, and can't own land, so the right of "next of kin" is denied to it already. Same as animals. You can form a trust to hold land on behalf of your favorite cat, but the cat can't own land. It's not about marying whoever you want. It's a rights issue about why some people can't enter into a legal contract with others on the same framework as other people.
That, and Congress has written a law explicitly contradicting the Constitution. The Defense of Marriage Act contradicts the "full faith and credit" clause. State A marries two gays, then they are married in all 50 states, as per the Constitution. Why Congress would pass an unconstitutional law explicitly against gay marriage, then take it upon themselves to champion the cause is beyond me. Just go back to Constitutional law. Let one state recognize it (say, New Hampshire) and then the gays can go there to get married, and then that "contract" will be recognized in the other 49. Problem solved. You can live in a place that doesn't recognize gay marriage, but still follows the Constitution, right?
Re:What about ladyboys? (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:True equality (Score:5, Insightful)
Funny, I don't see gays wanting *more* rights than heterosexuals. Just *equal* rights.
Re:Marriage =/= legal union. (Score:5, Insightful)
I do not think it matters as marriage has typically been of religious control. The state got involved because many were being excluded from marriage and it was more or less a power struggle between the ruling powers and religious authorities. Eventually, marriage carried legal ramifications when widowers rights, automatic transfer of ownerships and other legal benefits started being assigned automatically because of marital status.
In the debate on gay marriage, if those assigned legal rights were to be removed and separated- say applied for and consented to separately, the gay marriage debate would likely disappear. The big problem is mostly the mixing of religious born rituals with legal procedures.
Re:What about ladyboys? (Score:5, Insightful)
It is other people's business as soon as there are tax breaks or any other government "perks" or benefits to a legally recognized union. That's because the breaks and benefits are funded by the people as a nation.
Tax breaks? There's often a marriage penalty [wikipedia.org] for filing jointly. In some cases there's a tax benefit, but not all. But if the tax benefit of getting married is all that's stopping federal recognition of same-sex marriages, let's get rid of it for everyone (and I say that as a married person, but we file separately because there's no tax benefit for us to file jointly)
No tax breaks? No free daycare? No benefits to any union between consenting adults? No costs to tax payers? Then I don't care what you do.
Free daycare? How do I sign up for that marriage benefit? My wife and I seem to have missed that one. But even if free daycare was a benefit of marriage, presumably it's there to help children, so why shouldn't a same-sex couple with children qualify for the benefit? Or do you only support children who have opposite-sex parents?
None of the married couples I know (whether same sex or different sex) married for the tax-cuts or other monetary rewards from the government - aside from wanting to demonstrate commitment to each other via mamrriage, they are more interested in the legal protections offered by a state and federally recognized marriage (things like parental rights, easier adoption as a married couple, hospital visitation rights, ability to make decisions about spouse's medical care and disposition of body after death, easier access to partners funds after death of a spouse, ability to continue a lease after death of a partner, bereavement or FMLA protected leave to care for a sick spouse, protections via divorce)
Poland has an incentive (Score:2, Insightful)
Re:So now Google is literally a bunch of faggots? (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:Marriage =/= legal union. (Score:5, Insightful)
No problem with that.. but only if would stop recognizing marriage at all.
Scrap it from law all together. That way we would still end up with equallity for all.
Re:So now Google is literally a bunch of faggots? (Score:3, Insightful)
I am sure I will burn off some karma with this post, but I honestly believe that equality is there, but as long as communities continue to differentiate and not assimilate, than it is only preferential treatment that is being sought after.
Re:Faggotry (Score:5, Insightful)
Google should not be meddling with this. What happened to 'not be evil' This reeks of evil.
i don't think this is "evil", but i agree, google doesn't really need to be advertising one way or the other. Offering it to employees in same sex relationships is up to them, but to advertise? That's pushing it too far. What's next, abortion? I don't like seeing companies get political
every country has issues (Score:5, Insightful)
every country can improve
by your logic, no one can ever criticize any other country in the world outside of their own, because their own country still has problems and always will
fucking bullshit
i can criticize any country i want, including my own, and it's not hypocrisy. because i am first and foremost a human being, concerned with human rights, and with a human conscience. nationalist silos may confine your thinking, but not mine
don't think the parameters of your own self-chosen provincialism has any bearing on me
Re:Faggotry (Score:5, Insightful)
I don't know about the hate, but I will say that this is a divisive area and will create disdain with a portion of their user base. The country is about half split on the issue with alternatives to google popping up all the time.
This is a corporation getting involved in politics which seems to be the greatest evil that most people can agree on over the last 30 or more years. Of course some people will be shallow enough to excuse their favorite company getting into politics that do not directly involve their operation because it is something they want to support, but it doesn't change anything.
I guess the next question might be, what if Microsoft and GM decided to advocate the pro life argument and IBM all the sudden threw in support for teaching creation in schools. I'm assuming there would be differences in how that is viewed but in reality it is no different. These are just places that no corporation should be involved in- especially if they claim to do no evil which they are clearly participating in.
Re:Why not start at home? (Score:5, Insightful)
Exactly what I was coming to say.
Social change is a change in society's perception, rather than changing physical location, so you have to adapt the strategy to suit the need. Having 20% acceptance in five countries is more likely to spread change than having 100% acceptance in only a single country, because each country's acceptance grows on its own. In terms of a battle, this is a divide-and-conquer strategy, In terms of biology (a more appropriate analogy, IMHO), it's growing a flower garden from a hundred seeds rather than one.
In America, the "war" has already been won, as far as it will be for quite a while. Sexuality rights are at about the point that racial equality was during the 1960s: The most egregious laws have been fixed, and members of the oppressed groups fear bigots more than than the government. There are still enough bigots in the government, though, that continuing progress is stalled. Now we simply wait, taking every chance we can to point out that everyone, regardless of orientation, is still a person. Eventually enough bigots will die or retire, while the younger generation (who has grown up with the message of acceptance) takes office. Then the next round of change will happen, where all discrimination based on sexuality will be prohibited. Sure, there's always room for improvement... one more state allowing marriage, one more hate crime denounced nation-wide by the media, or one more teenager who's able to come out without being disowned by their family. It's unlikely, though, that any of that will significantly speed acceptance. The bigots are set in their ways.
Re:Faggotry (Score:1, Insightful)
Some do not see it as equal rights. They see it as extra rights. Right now, everyone who is capable of making decisions for themselves has the right to marry a person of the opposite sex if they are capable of the same and agree to the marriage. Two men or two women marrying each other is extra to those rights and it's something they want to be included because of choices they made in their life and perceived benefits extended through law.
Re:So now Google is literally a bunch of faggots? (Score:2, Insightful)
Some of those 'Google things' are things like open data, and open formats, something that is somewhat political, but a bit more technology related. Some of these things are in their best interests and some are not, but I like it when a corporation takes a stand on what it thinks is right. I like it better when those stands align with my own views, but as long as it's not against them, I think it's a good thing. It's pretty obvious that most countries are ruled these corporations these days anyway, so we might as well get the politics out into the open.
Why does it have to be "marriage"? (Score:2, Insightful)
I'm all for gay couples having the same kinds of rights as straight couples, but I don't understand why they have to use the term marriage. There are all kinds of examples where very similar products can only be called by a certain name under certain conditions...champagne versus sparkling wine is a good example. Why can't they keep marriage as referring to a man and a woman, like hundreds of years of tradition, and simply have a legally identical "civil union" or some other name? I don't see why they need to debase the term marriage to achieve their ends.
Re:World Pride 2012 (Score:5, Insightful)
You'd have to ask a gay person, but in this context, I interpret "Pride" as "not being ashamed".
Re:Marriage =/= legal union. (Score:4, Insightful)
Yes, I've never understood the conflation by the "Religious Right" of "marriage" in a secular sense versus "marriage" in a religious sense. Their stance equating the two seems to imply either a) God can be "forced" to recognize gay marriage in a -religious- sense by a vote of politicians, or b) the validity of marriage in a religious sense (and God per se, to some extent) is contingent upon public agreement.
Neither of which seems to be a stance a theist would actually want to take. Seems much more reasonable to leave the secular and religious scope of "marriage" to the sphere at hand, and not doing so seems much more indicative of political gamesmanship than dedication to one's religion.
As an aside, it's actually quite debatable whether the primary reason for censure of "gay sex" (not "homosexuality", as gay -orientation- in itself has not a single censure anywhere in the bible), is because it is homosexual, or whether it is because by definition as of the historical context, it would be unmarried, promiscuous sex, which is equally condemned for heterosexuals. But that, again, would be a debate for the religious sense of "marriage", and distinct from secular issues...
Re:Faggotry (Score:4, Insightful)
In my state, they tried to make it illegal for companies to offer domestic partner benefits. While this would have affected all unmarried couples, it was targeted at gays. The biggest employers in the state came out against it, because they know they can't attract the best employees if they can't offer those types of benefits that are attractive to employees. The same is true of a good city to live in: these companies know that by making their locations more attractive, they will get better employees. Google is trying to make their locations more attractive, and who can blame them? It's business, plain and simple, and in my opinion it's a nice example that shows that the interests of companies and individuals can indeed be aligned, though they often are not.
Re:So now Google is literally a bunch of faggots? (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:What about ladyboys? (Score:4, Insightful)
You might be getting modded down because you call them ladyboys. Use that term with your ladyboy friends if you want, but it might be better for the most part to go with more accepted terms like transgender and intersexed. It just sounds a little more respectful, so it's easier for people to hear your message.
Re:So now Google is literally a bunch of faggots? (Score:5, Insightful)
They don't. You are free to love, live with and raise together (sic) anyone you wish. Government provides benefits to married couples because households comprised of people in committed relationships contribute to social and economic stability. Personally, I don't believe it matters whether those relationships are between members of the opposite sex or not - they still contribute to social and economic stability.
On the other hand, outside of strict religious contexts, I don't believe that marital units comprised of more than 2 adults has the same effect of promoting stability. It's why you mainly see polygamy in strict religious cultures. Outside of strict religious cultures, you don't see polygamy working so well, for some reason.
Pair bonding of same-sex couples occurs in nature, as does, of course, pair bonding of opposite sex couples. I don't know if polygamous sexual bonding occurs in nature or not.
Pair bonding is good for society, regardless of the respective genders of the couple. It's healthy that society promotes it. As far as I can tell there are only two reasons to oppose same-sex marriage: on religious grounds or because of homophobia, and neither should enter into the law. Nobody's going to force anyone to engage in gay sex (Penn State locker rooms and rectories notwithstanding). I have yet to hear a legitimate reason for opposing same-sex marriage.
Re:So now Google is literally a bunch of faggots? (Score:5, Insightful)
A lot of people are crypto-theocrats of religions where homosexuality is a sin (mostly variants of Christianity), but most won't openly admit that they wish to force their religious rules on others, so they make up all the pretzel-logic bullshit reasons that confuse us today.
That's the whole thing in a nutshell. Get enough of those crypto-theocrats in a room together and they'll drop the facade and talk about how they want their government to follow Biblical rules and how it would be a sin to support same-sex marriage.
Re:Faggotry (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:adults living together (Score:5, Insightful)
As a somewhat liberal-minded person, I can't think of a reason why you or I would have any reason whatsoever to demand that other people explain to us why they want to enter into a mutual agreement. I know that the government marries some people. I know that some people want to marry some other people who happen to be same sex. That's all I need to know to be for gay marriage.
But since you bring it up. Gay people need marriage in order to get the same rights and benefits as straight people get when they marry. You could write a law that would allow gay people to have civil unions that would give them the same rights, but AFAIK there's no way to ensure that it stays that way over time as the laws change. Also, if one minority should have to settle for civil unions, why not another minority? For example why should Scientologists be allowed to marry? Can you prove that Scientologists are as good as non-Scientologists at parenting?
When you say that marriage is for a man and a woman you're merely making a fact claim, one that is true in some places and not true in other places. Don't confuse what is with what you think ought to be!
Re:Marriage =/= legal union. (Score:5, Insightful)
returns the term "marriage" to organized religion.
It doesn't belong to them.
Re:adults living together (Score:2, Insightful)
Think it's a bit more complicated than that..how children learn to relate to the opposing gender has a lot to do with how mom and dad interact, in both high brow and low brow areas.
A. reputable by whose standards? when it comes to issues like this, they're almost all guilty of selection bias.
B. you're welcome to assume whatever you like.. just like you're doing with this issue. it doesn't mean it's correct.