I just looked at your profile, and while your photo matches up reasonably well with your stated age, it's a well-known fact that photos can be misleading. For one thing, lots of people put up photos that aren't recent (I've seen people post profile photos of themselves that are from as long as 15 years ago). And then there are people who simply don't look their age -- they might look significantly older or younger than their age.

I have to wonder: What is the problem with revealing one's age anyway?

For example, age relates to life experience. Most people want to be with a partner who shares a reasonably similar level of experience. Therefore, knowing the age of a potential partner can be one factor in determining whether there is sufficient commonality in that aspect, although it shouldn't be the sole determining factor. I'm generally willing to date outside my preferred age range if a guy is really amazing. However, I very much doubt I'd be comfortable for long with one who was young enough to be my son, or old enough to be my father.

I suppose if you're a "cougar" or a middle-aged man and prefer much younger partners (say you're 55 and you really want a partner who's under 30) you might be reluctant to reveal your age. But in that case, you'd be in kind of an outlier group, and there actually ARE sites for men and women who are seeking relationships with that kind of age difference. A bit of Googling will give you a list of them. They're probably a better fit for you than most "plain vanilla" dating sites.

Thing is, even if you don't put your age, once you begin talking to someone they sooner or later ARE going to ask you. What happens if you tell them your age and they decide the age difference is more than they find comfortable? You'll have wasted however long you spent talking with them, and you'll have wasted that much of their time, too.

Which basically is the same thing. You don't want to be dismissed by women who prefer younger men. Thing is, YOU don't get to make that decision for them.


If you aren't interested in the age of your potential partners, the correct solution would be for YOU to ignore their age, rather than to conceal YOURS.

THAT isn't what we're talking about, and you know it. Please stop trying to confuse the issue.

A civil union or civil marriage is not between roommates or between grandparents and grandchildren, best friends, etc. "Marriage" is between a pair of adults who have opted to join their lives as partners. Anyone who's confused as to what constitutes a marriage is probably in the wrong discussion to begin with.

Marriage in the LEGAL sense (and that is ultimately what we're discussing here) is not some holy thing restricted only to a man and a woman who solemnly swear to be fruitful and multiply (but only to the extent allowed by their current and projected finances and only in approved coital positions), nor is it merely a financial arrangement into which any non-couple may choose to enter just for the heck of it.

Marriage in the legal sense is the set of obligations and protections given to a partnership between two adults who have chosen to commit to one another in what is commonly recognized as a loving partnership that is understood to involve permanent cohabitation and an intertwining of lives. It is choosing a mate and committing to that person.

Sorry, but that isn't the kind of thing a person does with their grandfather.


Agreed, but that isn't what marriage is about. Can we please stick to the subject?


I wasn't aware that this was being outlawed. Did I miss a memo?


Fine, agreed. Legal recognition of marriages between couples of the same gender is the right thing to do.

Thus far, nothing you've posted there has any bearing on how the legal recognition of same-sex marriage changes any of those issues. It's just more of the same rant.


How so? Please be specific in how this would be somehow "prevented" given that single-parent homes already exist? If denying legal recognition to same-sex married couples somehow prevented the existence of single-parent households, then given that we've only extended that recognition within the past few days, there should be very few single-parent households in existence. Are you asking us to believe that over 13 million single-parent households suddenly sprang into being in the past five days since the SCOTUS ruled on DOMA?


Who's teaching THAT???


I'm pretty sure the teaching of biology isn't going to be affected by the legal recognition of same-sex marriages. And outside of the mechanics of sexual activity as practiced by heterosexual, gay or lesbian couples, the relationships themselves pretty much ARE the same. Unless you're seriously suggesting that a relationship is ALL about, and ONLY about the way in which a couple has sex?

Newsflash: Relationships are NOT primarily about sex. Marriage is NOT about sex. Marriage in the legal sense is about financial and legal obligations, kinship rights, and the protection of property and privacy. Marriage in the interpersonal sense is about fidelity, love, and commitment. The ONLY difference between a homosexual relationship and a heterosexual one is in the mechanical details of sexual activity.

If more people focused less on sex, especially on sex between OTHER people, this would be a better world.

Let's turn the question around: What would be a valid reason NOT to want to disclose your age on a dating site???

(Used to be it was women who were regarded as being cagey about our ages. These days it's the guys. WTF?)

Please explain how legal recognition of same-sex marriage affects any of that. There are already fatherless and motherless homes among heterosexuals, and plenty of hetero families where both parents work (I'm almost 49 and grew up in one, and I'm just fine), etc. Please explain how preventing the recognition of same-sex marriage would in ANY way resolve the problems you just listed.

I would like to draw your attention to the portion of the above quote that I have emphasized with bold type and underlining. It contains the exact reasoning behind the decision to strike down DOMA.

As long as marriage is deemed a matter for the government to oversee, and as long as whom a person chooses to love remains a personal decision, the government CANNOT restrict its recognition of marriage to only heterosexual marriage without such restriction being interpreted as "taking an action against the personal choices" of those who love someone of the same sex.

Ergo, equalizing marriage recognition without regard to the genders of the couple serves to remove the government from the equation of personal choice.

So?


Right, because that isn't a requirement for marriage under the laws of the United States.


If something is not illegal, it is by definition LEGAL.


It is LEGAL in all 50 states if it is a heterosexual couple (and since the SCOTUS ruling, it is also legal for a same-sex couple in certain states).


Which is ZERO.


Logically, if by having something be legal that means it is also socially advocated (your original argument), then marriage-for-material-gain is socially advocated by virtue of the fact that it is legal.


Children must always come from a marriage? So if a person gets married, they're required to have children? And if someone gets pregnant, they're required to marry? Sorry, but that isn't how our laws work in the US.

So if something is legal, that means it's "socially advocated"?

So... it's advocated for some sexy young thang whose only "assets" are the ones contained in her 34DDD brassiere to marry some 95-year-old multimillionaire geezer with one foot in the grave and the other on a banana peel so she can get a big payday when he keels over?

After all, that's legal.

Or how about the heterosexual couple who meet in Las Vegas, complete strangers who stumble off drunkenly to a hotel room, get it on, wake up the next day and decide to get married before they've even crossed over the line from "still drunk" to "oh jeez my head" by some fat guy in an Elvis costume, and then once the hangover subsides a couple of days later, opt to divorce?

That's legal too.

So obviously either of these is perfectly okay and acceptable, whereas two men or two women who spend a lifetime faithfully together... say fifty or sixty years... no, they shouldn't be allowed get married because it's icky or would send the wrong message or something...?

Uh, maybe it's time to re-think this whole business of what really constitutes "socially acceptable".

Too good not to share.

Thank you.

Let's not pretend that biological children can't be conceived in a multiple ways.

The right for two adult human beings in love to marry in a civilly-recognized fashion cannot be made dependent upon their gender in a free society, any more than it can be made dependent upon their race, childbearing ability, income, creed or eye color. Human beings are either free and entitled to equal rights, or we must admit to preferring a caste system under which some are citizens of the first class, while others are relegated to the second, third or some even lower class.

I prefer freedom and equality over classism and caste divisions. Human rights are not subject to the whim of a majority vote. In the US, we've already covered that ground with emancipation, the civil rights movement, interracial marriage (see: Loving vs. Virginia) and the First Amendment itself.

There will likely always be religions which restrict who can marry whom within the traditions of their faith... and that is perfectly acceptable because this is a religiously pluralistic nation (again, see the First Amendment). Civil law does not affect religious marriage restrictions within the bounds of a given religion.

If the state has a vested interest in regulating marital unions for the purposes of shared property, hospital visitation and healthcare decisions, parental responsibilities, differential tax rates or other aspects of a marital or family unit, then it is plain that this interest applies regardless of the gender of those who are so united.

Not all heterosexual couples bear or adopt children, while some homosexual couples ARE parents (whether by adoption or by one or both partners producing a child), so clearly a couple's existing or potential parental status is not at issue here. After all, we do not restrict marriage only to those who are or are intending to become parents, nor even to those who are capable of reproducing. It is entirely legal for a man who has undergone a vasectomy or a woman who has had a hysterectomy to subsequently marry.

Here in the US, our culture predicates marriage upon a loving relationship; we do not generally condone marrying for the sake of money or other material gain, nor do we encourage the practice of strategic but impersonal marriages to produce alliances between powerful or wealthy families as was common among the aristocracy of Europe and elsewhere in centuries past. (Indeed, the bulk of the US population is not in a position where such marriages would even be a factor.) While we do often quietly encourage those who have produced a pregnancy out of wedlock to marry, we do not require it and we do not expect it of couples who know themselves to be incompatible for the long term.

So, what's left? Love. It has already been demonstrated that love is not exclusive to heterosexual couples, because homosexual couples also fall in love. With that in mind, we rightly place as few restrictions as possible upon the state of civil marriage, considering only the age of the couple (majority or age of consent to marry), whether or not either is currently married to another partner, competency to enter into a contractual agreement, and to some extent consanguinity.

An equal application of these considerations without restriction of gender is the only way to involve the state (by which I mean civil government at any level) in marriage without deliberately or inadvertently making an underclass of those who happen to love someone of the same rather than the opposite gender.

Best of luck to you, my friend. Of course, based on past experience, I'm sure you'll ace it, as always.

(Interview? Like for TV/radio/newspaper, maybe?)

Uh, no. For one thing, WAY too invasive. I mean, I'm not giving that kind of information, and in any case dating sites aren't going to be hooked up with some kind of international verification database.

Secondly, what would happen to people who were adopted and don't necessarily even KNOW the names of their biological parents?

So I hope (and kind of suspect) you were kidding there, but, whoa!

Seriously, I encountered a guy on another dating site once who did lie about his age in his profile stats. He admitted to this in the written section of his profile, which I thought took guts and I actually gave him credit for doing that. He'd only lied by 3 years, and looked young enough to have been that younger age. So we talked for a while anyway, because we had a lot in common.

Haven't spoken to him in ages and he's no longer on that site, but if I ran into him tomorrow and he seemed interested, I'd still be willing to date him. People fib about all kinds of small things, and three years of age is a small thing for folks hovering around the half-century mark. Three years, twenty pounds or a few thousand dollars of income (if that even gets mentioned at all) are fibs I can live with if everything else about the person clicks for me.

If I find out a guy is actually not single though, or something else major, that's a deal-breaker.

Before we can address that question, I think you'll need to define what you mean by "throwing themselves on men".

There are some who think a woman should never bring up or show interest in sex at all, and if they do, they're "throwing themselves" at a guy. I don't think that's what you mean but I would like to know what your definition actually is.

Still single. Haven't yet met the person who trips my trigger and had it be mutual.

One of these days...

I think many of us would be unwilling to date someone who DIDN'T give their age. Lots of people look either older or younger than their actual age, and I prefer to know how old a guy is if I'm going to date him, so I'll have an idea of how much we're going to have in common in terms of things we've experienced or remember.

Also, think about how the sorting and search algorithms are set up. When you go to search for compatible matches on a site, you plug in various criteria to be used in the search. One of those is age. Without it, I could find myself searching for compatible guys and have it turn up a lot who are 20 years older than me, or up to 30 years younger (yes, they'd still be over 18!). I'm not interested in dating someone 20 years older or 30 years younger than myself, and I think that's probably true for most of us.

THIS.

I'm female, I demand respect, and I also want a healthy sex life. Sometimes I'm even the one who gets the ball rolling in that direction, if you know what I mean.

Double-standards are so last century. I'm open about what I want when I'm dating someone, and about what my boundaries are. In my experience, most men DO respect women who use that approach.